StatBadger

Baseball is a beautiful game. For as long as it’s been around, the game has been largely characterized by its constancy. Sure, the sport has seen its fair share of changes, like a lowered mound and the introduction of designated hitters. But over 100 years since its inception — during which time players’ athleticism has improved greatly — the mound is still 60 feet and six inches from the back of the plate, and the bases are still (roughly) 90 feet apart. There’s something about this game that just works.

Naturally, the way to find a competitive advantage in this game is through strategy. In today’s game, though, one approach has become almost ubiquitous in the baseball world. This strategy says, since batting is as hard as it’s ever been, you’re best off scoring in as few hits as possible. In other words: Batters, aim for the fences.

No team has resisted this approach, but some have embraced it more than others. Interestingly, though, the World Series featured one team that swam upstream of it (at least as much as any competitive team could). The Blue Jays played a different brand of baseball. The team’s .265 batting average paced MLB by seven points, and they coupled that with the second fewest strikeouts in baseball. The Blue Jays also boasted the top ranked defense on FanGraphs. They’re the closest thing we have to an old school ball club, and we got to see their style of play on baseball’s biggest stage and against its best team.

Did it work? Well, the Blue Jays obviously lost to the Dodgers, three games to four. But I’d argue it’s not that simple.

The Dodgers won, yes, but they don’t exactly epitomize the new style of play more than most teams. In fact, they’re almost in a category of their own. They hardly have to choose between batting for average or power; it’s almost like they have too much talent not to bat for a high average while still hitting lots of home runs. They ranked second in MLB in home runs and sixth in batting average. It doesn’t sound like there’s much of a sacrifice taking place.

A better case study would be the Yankees. The Yankees will accept a higher strikeout rate if it means generating higher exit velocities when they do make contact. And for them, the strategy works. They struck out the third-most times across MLB, but, buoyed by an MLB-best 274 home runs, they ended the season tied for the best record in the American League.

They were tied, of course, with the Blue Jays. And the Blue Jays had the tiebreaker.

So, chalk Round 1 up to the Blue Jays. Still, one game doesn’t prove much in the span of a 162-game season. After all, playoff performance speaks a lot louder than regular season wins and losses.

When the teams faced each other in the ALDS, though, the Blue Jays trounced the Yankees, three games to one. They won the battle and the war.

Back to the World Series, it seems fair to say the Blue Jays proved everything they needed to on baseball’s biggest stage. They batted .269 against one of the best pitching staffs in baseball. They outscored the Dodgers 34 runs to 26 (while stranding, mind you, an astounding 54 runners). They did this while actually hitting home runs at a lower clip than they did during the regular season. (For perspective, they ranked 11th in total home runs in the regular season and 13th in home run frequency, averaging 28.83 AB/HR. During the World Series, that number plummeted to 34.88 AB/HR — which would’ve ranked 27th in MLB.)

They pitched well (to the tune of a 3.21 ERA), and they played good defense, but their basic strategy was to get hits without forcing those hits to be home runs. By doing this, they nearly managed to usurp a team unbelievably replete with All-Stars and MVP’s, including quite possibly the best player to ever step on a baseball field. And had it not been for multiple improbable events (Andy Pages’ catch, Miguel Rojas’ home run…), they’d be World Series champs. Any team would take those odds.

It’s an interesting study in a landscape where scoring runs in the most efficient way (AKA, hitting home runs) is almost universally seen as a key ingredient for a great offense.

If you look at the years before the Dodgers built their dynasty, the numbers tell a different story. From 1990 to 2023, only 10 World Series champions had ranked in the top five in regular season home runs. Only twice since 1990 has the World Series champion ranked first in this metric.

The record-setting 2023 Braves, for instance, who hit 307 home runs and whose top five batters averaged an absurd 41 home runs per batter, were cut down in the NLDS. The 2025 Yankees were the latest version of this and fared no better. In fact, this year, two of the top five teams in total home runs missed the postseason entirely (the Mets and, if you’d believe it, the Angels).

We’re far from flipping the script on offensive strategy, but this much is clear: Hitting home runs isn’t enough. Los Angeles has built a juggernaut, and teams seeking to take down their star-studded lineup need to get creative. Beating them takes more than small ball (citing this year’s Brewers), but perhaps not less. The Blue Jays hung with the Dodgers in a way no other team has — and it might be time for the rest of the baseball world to take notes.