Decades from now, we will still be talking about how masterful Trey Yesavage was against the Los Angeles Dodgers in Game 5 of the World Series.
The Blue Jays’ rookie phenom rose to the class of eyebrow-raising and chills-inducing feats we haven’t seen from pitchers in the postseason since the halcyon days of Bob Gibson, Sandy Koufax, Tom Seaver, Don Newcombe… the list goes on.
Yesavage struck out 12 Dodgers and allowed no walks on 104 pitches. He whiffed half the batters he faced, at one point striking out five consecutively, to send the Blue Jays back to Toronto in need of one more win to become the world champions.
To think, just five months ago, Yesavage was a 21-year-old cipher pitching in Low-A ball, facing teenagers and twenty-somethings. He is now the first pitcher in history who started a game in Low A, High A, Double A, Triple A, and the World Series all in the same year.
Years from now, we will still be in awe.
“Walking from the bullpen to the dugout, I took a moment to look around the stadium, see all the fans I wanted to — I was hoping I would send ’em home upset,” Yesavage said Wednesday night at Dodger Stadium after his Game 5 brilliance. “It was just a cool, like, full-circle moment.”
‘You Still Can’t Do Anything About It’
Only 503 days ago, he was drafted by the Blue Jays in the first round (20th pick). The East Carolina product began the 2025 season in the Low-A Florida State League, making seven starts before he was promoted to the High-A Northwest League in May. Less than a month later, he was asked to keep climbing the minor-league ladder. Yesavage recorded seven starts and one relief appearance for the Double-A Eastern League. Finally, in August, he was promoted to the Triple-A International League, where he posted a 3.63 ERA in six outings (four starts) for the Buffalo Bisons.
It was just only over a year ago, Trey Yesavage was drafted out of college. (Photo by Richard Rodriguez/Getty Images)
In mid-September, he got the call. Yesavage was promoted to the major leagues for Toronto’s pennant push. It was viewed as a tryout. The Blue Jays closely monitored his performance across only three major-league starts, evaluating whether he was prepared to be added to their postseason roster. Not only was he October-ready. After his exceptional Game 5 performance, it’s clear he was born to pitch in the World Series.
“First, you’d have to credit the Blue Jays for moving him along so rapidly, which is a rarity within itself,” former All-Star pitcher Dontrelle Willis, who pitched as a rookie for the Miami Marlins in the 2003 World Series, told me. “This kid is wise beyond his years in the sense of, he knows how his stuff plays to the hitter, and that’s a big ingredient.
“And with that split-change, at one point, he was just throwing it at will. It was almost like a cheat code. Like everybody in the stands, everybody on both sides knew this pitch was coming, and you still can’t hit it. It’s one of those pitches where it’s like a Clayton Kershaw slider, where you know it’s coming. You know it’s coming, and you still can’t do anything about it.”
A unique arm angle and an impressive selection has helped Trey Yesavage turn into a postseason star. (Photo by Keith Birmingham/MediaNews Group/Pasadena Star-News via Getty Images)
Yesavage has now made more playoff starts than regular-season outings.
It took guts for the Blue Jays’ brain trust to promote him from Low-A ball to the World Series all in one season. But then again, he all but forced their hand. Yesavage tossed three perfect innings and struck out four in his final minor-league start on Sept. 10. Blue Jays general manager Ross Atkins said Yesavage “made the decision for us” after witnessing his undeniable strikeout rate and rapid rise through the minors. But the front office could never have anticipated that Yesavage would be this elite, this soon.
“Guys that are being taken in the first round are usually dominating, usually are performing at such high levels that the makeup reports are always pretty good,” Atkins said of Yesavage last week at the Rogers Centre. “It’s going to be, yeah, this guy’s a bulldog, he’s a warrior, he works his tail off and never backs down from a challenge. But then the game gets faster, and the talent gets higher, and the stages are bigger, and that exposes some things.
“So if we had the magic formula to tell you that Trey Yesavage was going to be able to handle this when we acquired him, we probably would have had a lot more success prior to today. You just never know, and it’s the hardest thing to evaluate, in my opinion.”
‘Hollywood Couldn’t Have Made it This Good’
Yesavage has received a slew of praise for his composure as a rookie — and we’re not just talking about when he makes in-game adjustments on the mound. After pitching in front of fewer than 500 people at Low-A stadiums just five months ago, he took the World Series stage at the historic Dodger Stadium in front of 52,175 fans like he’d been doing it for a decade. Plus, he has handled his increased media obligations with aplomb. Some veterans who play for small-market clubs still get flustered with the larger number of national reporters in a postgame clubhouse in the postseason.
And then there’s the overflow of information. The 22-year-old is routinely being schooled by his teammates, including future first-ballot Hall of Famer Max Scherzer. Rather than being rattled or overwhelmed by all the instruction and advice from experienced veterans, Yesavage has relied on them to prepare himself for starting in the World Series. After Game 5, he shouted out Kevin Gausman, Shane Bieber, and Scherzer for helping him make the quick transition and ascension into a Blue Jays legend.
“It’s been a crazy year, but being surrounded by vets is a great thing for the future of my career,” Yesavage said. “They have treated me the best I could have ever asked for. So going forward with other rookies that come up, I’m going to remember how I was treated when I got here. The poise part, I don’t know, you got to thank my parents.”
Willis described pitching out of the bullpen as a 21-year-old rookie in the 2003 World Series as “an out-of-body experience.” It was only until the next day, when he had a moment to gather his thoughts, that he wondered how he even did it. And that’s coming from the southpaw who won the Rookie of the Year award that year. Willis believes Yesavage won’t realize how monumental his performance was until it’s all over, which could very well be on Friday night after World Series Game 6, with the Blue Jays lifting the championship trophy.
“It’s a crazy world. Crazy world,” Yesavage said. “Hollywood couldn’t have made it this good. Just being a part of this, I’m just very blessed.”
Deesha Thosar covers Major League Baseball as a reporter and columnist for FOX Sports. She previously covered the Mets as a beat reporter for the New York Daily News. The daughter of Indian immigrants, Deesha grew up on Long Island and now lives in Queens. Follow her on Twitter at @DeeshaThosar.
