Kevin Gausman Gets the Nod for World Series Game 2

TORONTO — Kevin Gausman has chased this moment through so many seasons and lives as a baseball player.

Gausman is a first-round pick who’s pitched 13 seasons in the big leagues, but that doesn’t really tell his story. He’s been the top prospect and the next big thing, but he’s also failed, bounced around and been designated for assignment. His road here has been long, complicated and full of potholes.

This is part of what makes Gausman great, though. He’s earned his Game 2 start in the World Series, and would have fit just fine in Game 1, too, but the Blue Jays wanted to give the veteran an extra day of rest while keeping rookie sensation Trey Yesavage on schedule.

This version of Gausman, who reinvented himself as a dominant starter with a devastating splitter before signing his five-year, $110 million deal with the Blue Jays prior to the 2022 season, is the best yet. That’s not why he’s beloved in this market, though. Toronto has seen plenty of talent and plenty of great pitching over the years, but this is a market that wants to be embraced by its stars. Canada’s lone team hasn’t always felt that, but Gausman has endeared himself to a country of baseball fans.

“Signing here, I didn’t necessarily understand that it’s one team for an entire country,” Gausman explained. “Now that I’ve been here for four years, I really understand how much they love us, how much they support us, how much they want us to succeed. If you play well in Toronto, as you’ve seen, all those guys from the 2015 and ‘16 teams are coming back and throwing out the first pitches, those guys are legends.”

He’s been on the wrong end of the postseason in Toronto, too. The Blue Jays made the postseason in 2022 and ‘23, but lost quickly and painfully in the Wild Card Series.

The 2025 Blue Jays are the culmination of all of those years, finally working after something was missing along the way. Gausman is 34 now and he’s realistic. He jokes often about feeling older, and while the odd guy named Max Scherzer pitches into their 40s, that’s the outlier. Gausman has one year remaining on his deal with the Blue Jays in ‘26, but with this being his first trip to the World Series in his 13-year career, he knows this might be his best shot.

“The first couple years were rough and heartbreaking,” Gausman said. “To get swept back-to-back years in the postseason in the Wild Card was tough. Last year was even tougher because it felt like we were a really good team but just didn’t play very well, and we all just kind of got punched in the face. I felt like the organization did a really great job of looking internally while also kind of figuring out moves they needed to make. Hat’s off to them for doing everything that they have to get us to this point, and it’s taken a lot of different people.”

In the end, the decision between Yesavage and Gausman for Games 1 and 2 shouldn’t matter much. Both will have the opportunity to come back around for a second start later in the series, and could even pitch out of the bullpen like Gausman did in Game 7 of the ALCS. There’s no “next series” to save up for, either, so they’ll empty the tank.

Yes, they’re both starters who lead with a splitter and rely heavily on that with two strikes, but that’s not as concerning as it normally might be.

“It’s a similar arsenal, but their pitches do very, very different things from different angles,” manager John Schneider said.

Yesavage’s splitter tends to have more tailing action compared to Gausman’s, which plummets straight down. Besides, Yesavage’s release point looks like it comes from the roof of the stadium, too, so this still qualifies as different looks. The Blue Jays were once hesitant to use relievers like Erik Swanson following Gausman given that their splitters were similar, but Yesavage’s unique profile eliminates most of this conversation entirely.

Besides, Gausman has enough to worry about already with Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman and the rest of the stacked Dodgers lineup. This is what he’s been waiting his entire career for, though.

The path to get here hasn’t been what Gausman always had in mind, but he’s right where he belongs, pitching in the biggest game of his life Saturday night in Toronto.