Young Trey Yesavage puts Blue Jays up 3-2 on Dodgers
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LOS ANGELES -- Trey Yesavage set a World Series rookie record with 12 strikeouts, and the Toronto Blue Jays opened Game 5 with back-to-back homers in a 6-1 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Wednesday that moved them within one win of their first championship since 1993.
Davis Schneider and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. homered on Blake Snell's first and third pitches, the first consecutive homers to start a Series game.
Yesavage, a precocious 22-year-old right-hander who started his season last April pitching before 327 fans in Class A, took over from there.
With a sinking splitter, spinning slider and overpowering fastball that quieted LA bats and a crowd of 52,175, he broke the prior rookie record of 11 strikeouts set by Don Newcombe for the Dodgers in a 1-0 loss to the New York Yankees in the 1949 opener. Getting six Ks each with his splitter and slider, Yesavage became the first Series pitcher with 12 strikeouts and no walks.
Yesavage allowed three hits over seven innings and his only run when Kike Hernandez homered on a high fastball to trim the Dodgers' deficit to 2-1 in the third.
Yesavage debuted with the Blue Jays on Sept. 15, his fifth level of baseball this year. He made three regular-season starts and now is 3-1 in five postseason outings.
He induced 23 swings and misses -- most in a Series game since pitch tracking started in 2008, one more than San Francisco's Tim Lincecum in 2010 Game 5.
Toronto will have a chance to dethrone the defending champions when the Series resumes Friday night at Rogers Centre. No team has won consecutive titles since the New York Yankees took three in a row from 1998-2000.