Yoshinobu Yamamoto threw the first pitch of the Dodgers’ 2025 season in Tokyo, Japan, and he threw the last pitch of the year in Game 7 of the World Series in Toronto, Canada. The only member of the team’s starting rotation active for the entire season, Yamamoto was the ace who trumped everything else, and secured the Dodgers’ second championship in a row while winning World Series MVP.

Signed to the richest contract ever signed by a pitcher, a 12-year, $325-million pact that looks like a steal two years in, Yamamoto is the Dodgers’ pitcher most on a specific schedule, never starting with fewer than five days rest, by design to keep him on a routine he is used to, and on a team usually with the depth to facilitate such a schedule. Yet it was Yamamoto who loomed most as a Bill Brasky-type

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