The Toronto Blue Jays stunned the Seattle Mariners with a three-run dinger in the seventh inning to take Game 7 of the 2025 American League Championship Series 4-3.
George Springer belted the go-ahead home run to flip the tables on a 3-1 Mariner lead. The Blue Jays got a 1-2-3 ninth inning from Jeff Hoffman to seal their first trip to the World Series since 1993.
While the Blue Jays have made several postseason appearances since Joe Carter’s walk-off blast, the club had never made it back to the Fall Classic. The closest it had gotten was in 2015 and 2016 when a star-studded Toronto team made consecutive ALCS appearances.
Now, a relatively underrate Blue Jays squad rode strong starting pitching and timely hitting to their first World Series appearance in 32 years.
The Jays will now face the powerhouse Los Angeles Dodgers. The Dodgers swept the Milwaukee Brewers in the NLCS. So, the matchup promises to feature some of MLB’s biggest stars. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. will face Shohei Ohtani in what could be one of the most memorable World Series of all time.
Game 1 will be on Friday at Rogers Centre in Toronto. The Dodgers will be looking to shake off a long layoff, while the Blue Jays will try to keep the momentum going.
Springer Comes Up Huge for Blue Jays
The hero for the Toronto Blue Jays in Game 7 was the most experienced playoff performer on the team. George Springer continued his resurgent season, taking Eduardo Bazardo deep. The blast gave Toronto the lead after reliever Bryan Woo had pitched two scoreless innings of relief.
However, Woo got into trouble, forcing Seattle manager Dan Wilson to bring Bazardo in to face Springer. Two pitches later, the game went from 3-1 in favor of Seattle, to a 4-3 Toronto lead.
Springer went 0-for-4 in Game 6, but came back to notch the biggest hit of the Blue Jays’ season in Game 7. It was his fourth home run this postseason, bringing his RBI tally to nine.
Moving forward, Springer will be looking to rekindle the magic that had seen him go to the World Series twice before with the Houston Astros. Springer got a ring in 2017, a postseason in which he notched 21 hits and six home runs.
Toronto Bullpen Outstanding in Game 7
Shane Bieber got the start in Game 7, tossing 3.2 innings, allowing seven hits and two runs. Blue Jays manager John Schneider gave Bieber the hook in the fourth inning as Julio Rodriguez came to bat with runners on.
Rodriguez had already homered off Bieber earlier in the game. So, Schneider brought in the hard-throwing Louis Varland to end the inning. Varland gave up a solo dinger to Cal Raleigh to make the game 3-1.
That would be the only hit the Mariners would manage off Blue Jays relievers. Kevin Gausman, who pitched the seventh, gave up three walks, one intentional. But he managed to get out of the inning unscathed.
Chris Bassitt pitched the eighth, with Hoffman striking out the side in the ninth. Hoffman had pitched two innings in Game 6 to preserve the win.
With about three days off, the Blue Jays’ pitching bullpen should have plenty of time to recover. The rest will help the club ahead of the biggest showdown of the season.
Like Heavy Sports’s content? Be sure to follow us.
This article was originally published on Heavy Sports
The post Blue Jays Stun Mariners, Advance to World Series appeared first on Heavy Sports.