TORONTO — In a video game, there’s a difference between a boss and the final boss.
The bosses, who make up those big battles along the way, tend to have one superpower, each of them training you for the cinematic ending, the final battle to beat the game.
The Blue Jays have defeated Aaron Judge, maybe the best all-around hitter in the game. They’ve defeated Cal Raleigh, baseball’s home run king. Now, at the end of it all, waits Shohei Ohtani, the final boss. Even on baseball’s version of The Avengers, Ohtani is the one man standing between Toronto and its first World Series championship in 32 years. He’s everyone the Jays have beaten to get here, all combined into one monster, breathing fire atop the mountain.
“I think we’re talking about a totally different kind of animal here that can do things on the field that not many people can do,” Blue Jays manager John Schneider said, “with all the respect in the world for Aaron Judge and Cal Raleigh.”
Like Judge and Raleigh, Ohtani cannot be dominated, only survived. This doesn’t need to be perfect; the Blue Jays just need to survive it.
Ohtani will loom over every pitching decision the Blue Jays make, and while Toronto’s starters will need to muffle his impact atop the lineup, the moves Schneider makes in the middle innings could decide this series. Ohtani, just like Judge and Raleigh, feels like the turning point of each game, the first moment Schneider will need to insert himself and make a move.
“Elite talent, obviously,” Schneider said. “I think you have to be very mindful of when the top of the order is coming around, right? We’ve talked at length about how to treat it, we’ve talked at length about when to do this, and you’ve got to read the situation. They have a great team. They have three Hall of Famers at the top of their lineup.”
The 1st battle: Toronto’s right-handed starters vs. Ohtani
Ohtani’s worst series was the National League Division Series, where 16 of his 20 total plate appearances against the Phillies were facing lefties. (Ohtani went 1-for-18 overall with two walks and nine strikeouts.) Trey Yesavage, Kevin Gausman, Shane Bieber and Max Scherzer are all righties.
Yesavage and Gausman? Let’s call them the splitter guys. Beware: Ohtani crushes that pitch.
Against right-handed splitters, Ohtani has a .358 average, .868 slugging percentage and 63% hard-hit rate since joining the Dodgers, all eye-popping numbers. That said, both Gausman and Yesavage have special splitters, and combined, they’ve held lefties to a .068 average (3-for-44) with 19 strikeouts and just one walk with that pitch in the postseason. This is the ultimate “strength on strength” matchup.
We can group Scherzer and Bieber together, too. If this is going to work, they’ll need to be known as the curveball guys. Bieber’s knuckle-curve is more frequently used than Scherzer’s curveball, but each could lean on that against Ohtani, whose highest whiff rate when facing right-handed pitchers comes against curves (45%).
Both Scherzer and Bieber feature a slider and a cutter, but Ohtani crushes pitches with those movement profiles. Against righty sliders and cutters, he has hit .311 with a .784 slugging percentage and a 68% hard-hit rate in 2025. That Statcast-projected 469-footer he launched in Game 4 of the NL Championship Series? It came against a cutter, down, in and out of the zone.
For both Scherzer and Bieber, who will likely line up in Games 3 and 4 in some order, a two-strike curveball may be their best shot at surviving Ohtani.
The 2nd battle: Toronto’s bullpen vs. Ohtani
If the Blue Jays are going to win the World Series, it feels like they’ll need an unlikely bullpen hero. At some point, the spotlight will likely shift to one of Brendon Little, Mason Fluharty or Eric Lauer, with Fluharty already having that great moment against Ohtani, striking him out to earn his first career save on Aug. 10 in Los Angeles.
Let’s start with the important thing, which is arm angles. Little (35-degree arm angle), Fluharty (34 degrees) and Lauer (36 degrees) all have lower than average arm angles, creating a funkier delivery in a left-on-left situation. Here’s what the data from 2025 tells us:
Ohtani vs. LHP with arm angles of 40 degrees or higher
Ohtani vs. LHP with arm angles lower than 40 degrees
The NLDS against the Phillies is a great example. Against lefties Cristopher Sánchez, Jesús Luzardo, Ranger Suárez and Matt Strahm, Ohtani went just 1-for-15 with eight strikeouts. All four had lower arm angles.
Little’s sinker could be a weapon here, or the Blue Jays could play with fire and spam Ohtani with breaking balls, especially Little’s curve and Fluharty’s slider, which both of them love to throw. Ohtani has a high whiff rate against breaking balls from lefties (38%), but also a .333 batting average, so the contact can be dangerous.
Each throws a cutter, too, which Ohtani has rarely seen from lefties (3% in 2025). So the element of surprise could help.
Someone will be tasked with Ohtani eventually. And whether that is closer Jeff Hoffman or the unlikely hero in this season’s last act, the Blue Jays can’t win the World Series without beating the final boss.
