October 27, 2025

It looked like the Toronto Blue Jays really had the Dodgers on the ropes there on Saturday night. The Jays were constantly threatening early, but Yoshinobu Yamamoto not only worked his way out of that trouble, but had the physical and mental toughness to throw his 2nd straight postseason complete game. Nobody in Dodgers history has done that in 4 decades. Now we’re tied coming back to LA. It’s going to be tough for either team to win 3 straight games, but if the Dodgers can win 2 of the next 3 they will be in great shape to repeat as Champions. The Dodgers have an edge in pitching in all 3 of those games. The toughest part though? The pitching in almost every game has been transcendent level. At some point, they will need some help from the bullpen. I know the choices are few and far between down there, but the next three Dodger pitchers certainly aren’t going to give you complete games. They’ve got to step up and provide some relief. The good news for the Dodgers is the Blue Jays bullpen isn’t exactly lights out either. Winning this series against the likes of notorious 2017 cheater George Springer, and former 2021 “me-first” Dodger Max Scherzer would be extra sweet. Also, credit to Andrew Friedman and Dave Roberts for being flexible. I’ve always made fun of them for their overly analytics approach, but they are now using their starters as starters, despite the fact that line 57 of the spreadsheet is telling them otherwise. That flexibility is what gives them the greatest chance to repeat as champions. That and the fact that they just sound very confident they are going to win.

While we are on the subject of baseball, the Angels simply can’t get out of their own way, and made headlines with more embarrassment last week. They hired Kurt Suzuki as their new manager, and gave him a one year deal. They simply would not hire Albert Pujols or Tori Hunter because they wanted “too much money” in the eyes of cheapskate owner Arte Moreno. It’s clear that Arte has no interest in paying a Manager or General Manager if there is a potential lockout. However, if this is his attitude, then the man has no intention of building any kind of sustainable success. Although most of us already knew that, it’s an obnoxious reminder of what his approach is. One area of hope Angels fans can hold onto: the idea that Moreno would have to sell the team if his franchise is found liable in court over the death of Tyler Skaggs. Although that is considered unlikely, one can hold onto hope.

I love how Austin Reaves plays every game like he is still trying to make an NBA roster. The man is turning into an NBA All-Star before our very eyes, after he dropped a career high 51 points last night in a win against Sacramento. The Lakers did however got some early bad news. They will be without Luka Doncic for the next week with a finger sprain and a leg contusion. I’m going to spare all of you the jokes about how soft today’s NBA players are, and how they are like Charmin Tissue Paper. Ok sorry, I couldn’t help myself. But this is very unfortunate because the Lakers are already without Lebron and Jaxton Hayes. If they can get through the next week with a 2-2 record, they should be content. Luka was really on fire in his first two games. When this team is healthy, I think they do have a lot of promise, but that might be another month away from happening. I really like Marcus Smart and he gives them an edge and toughness the Lakers haven’t had in a long time. I like Jake LaRavia too, but his barber should be in prison. A lot of you are killing DeAndre Ayton, but last night he showed you just how impactful he can be on this team. Some of you that watch this team need your head examined. Austin was clearly injured in the playoffs last year, but you all thought he sucked and needed to be traded. Now he’s going off, and your next thought is that the Lakers are somehow better off trading Lebron. What you should be thinking is just how elite this team can be with Luka, Lebron, and Austin. In the meantime, it’s going to be the Austin Reaves show for the next week!

The Clippers are off to an ok start, with a couple of wins, following their opening night loss to Utah. However, the best news for them is this FBI investigation going on involving Chauncey Billups and Terry Rozier. This is an incredibly bad look for the NBA, and one they really don’t have much control over because the Federal Government is involved in this matter. I find it very hard to believe Adam Silver would add to the negative publicity going on right now but punishing the Clippers for circumventing the salary cap. Timing is everything, and the timing is working out quite favorably for the Clips. The league doesn’t need negative publicity with new TV deals with Amazon and NBC. There is obviously an issue with gambling that needs to be addressed, but Steve Ballmer already placed his gamble on Kawhi’s knees and lost.

In the NFL, the Rams had a bye week but the Chargers came up with an easy but important win on Thursday night against the Vikings. The Bolts are really banged up, so it was important to get a win, even if it was against a team that should probably be relegated to the CFL at this point. Justin Herbert was great again. I don’t know how much healthier the Bolts will be in 10 days from now, but they should be able to beat an even weaker opponent in the Titans, who I’m not even sure are trying to win football games at this point.

It was a nice run while it lasted, but UCLA came crashing back to earth on Saturday against Indiana. The Bruins took a senseless beating from the Hoosiers, 56-6 in Bloomington. The Bruins were outmanned on both sides of the ball. Indiana is going to beat a lot of teams whether the opponent is new to the Big 10 or not. Tim Skipper deserves credit getting players who weren’t highly ranked to play well the previous three games. Beating Nebraska is possible with this team. Toppling Ohio State, Washington and USC less so. If they can just keep those games competitive, it will be an accomplishment. The better question is what UCLA is going to do with their coaching search. James Franklin is still the best guy they can hire. I sure hope Brian Kelly isn’t the guy for the job, or else we’ll be hearing him manufacture some surfer guy California accent in his press conferences.

Finally, I mean to ask this question in the most respectful way possible. Is LA Kings Coach Jim Hiller an idiot? Anybody with half a brain can see that the Kings best defenseman and best player is Brandt Clarke. He’s only 22 years old, but Hiller has shown that he hates trusting young players. Well his young player in this case has the potential to be an elite NHL Defenseman, yet he’s playing him fewer minutes than any of his other defenseman. A handful of those defenseman are complete scrubs that his useless GM signed over the summer. I’m absolutely terrified that Clarke will eventually go the way of other young players this organization has seen the last 5-7 years, and get traded for a used bag of pucks. Here’s to hoping I’m wrong.