I would like to preface the following column with an apology to any fans of the Los Angeles Dodgers reading this. Given the University’s location near the heart of L.A., I have to assume a large chunk of Daily Trojan sports readers support the Dodgers — and, therefore, aren’t particularly interested in reading 900 words criticizing their favorite baseball team. That being said …

I desperately, profusely, do not want the Dodgers to win the 2025 World Series. Words cannot express how overwhelmingly I desire to watch them get smacked around by the Toronto Blue Jays for four games. I have not felt this strongly about the outcome of a World Series since I started watching the sport.

The easiest and most obvious way I can convey this is through the money. The idea that the Dodgers are “ruining baseball” with their exorbitant spending habits is nothing new; fans were lamenting their ability to lock down top free agents and trade targets even before the front office shelled out a record $700 million to two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani before the 2024 season.

But, I mean, come on. The Dodgers had a 2025 payroll of $321 million, roughly 33% above the luxury tax threshold designed to limit teams’ spending — and that’s after deferring almost all of Ohtani’s $70 million to after his contract expires, allowing them to spend even more money on even more players.

Look at the rotation, for example. In the National League Championship Series, the Dodgers allowed the Milwaukee Brewers to score just one run in each of the four games, thanks to an unbelievable group of starting pitchers: Blake Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow and Ohtani. They have combined for a 1.36 ERA across the Dodgers’ 10 postseason games so far. Incredible, right?

Now look at the contracts: Those four players are signed on to make a combined $1.34 billion while playing for Los Angeles, acquired from three free agency deals and a trade that was quickly followed by a massive contract extension. Oh, and I almost forgot: None of them were on the team before the 2024 season.

This Dodgers team has no history. They aren’t brimming with homegrown talent. This is a superteam methodically assembled to be as good as possible, no matter the cost, and they have done just that for the past two years — winning a title in 2024 and well on their way to winning another in 2025 after losing one total game across their first three playoff series.

Few baseball moments have disgusted me more than when the Dodgers clinched the NL pennant with a win over the Brewers last Friday. The crowd went mild; they’d been there before. The players casually high-fived like they just won a day game in mid-August. Outfielder Andy Pages tossed the game-winning ball into the stands, as though it held no significance.

And really, it didn’t. This is the fifth time in nine years that the Dodgers will play in the Fall Classic; that’s more than the number of times the Colorado Rockies have won 70 games — 11 below 0.500 — during that span. For comparison, the Blue Jays haven’t made the World Series in 32 years, and their fans made it clear with an actual celebration after winning Game 7.

So, the choices are a perennial juggernaut with two championships since 2020 or a scrappy Toronto team that hasn’t had a chance at the Commissioner’s Trophy since well before I was born. Why would I — or any baseball fan, for that matter — even consider rooting for Los Angeles? If you aren’t already a Dodgers fan, the answer is simple: You wouldn’t.

I haven’t even mentioned the possible long-term repercussions of a Dodgers championship. ESPN insider and ball knower Jeff Passan recently wrote about the looming labor battle between MLB and the Players Association: Owners want a salary cap, while players want a salary floor — and the divide between the two groups could be a serious obstacle for the next collective bargaining agreement, potentially jeopardizing the 2027 season as a whole.

Passan argued that MLB owners will likely use another Dodger title as evidence supporting the need for a salary cap; if the team that spends the most wins the most, then clearly, owners all just need to spend less to make the game fair. While I don’t agree with that hypothetical line of reasoning, I completely agree with Passan that owners will use any excuse they can get to hoard more of their money, and the Dodgers winning it all would be a pretty good one.

But aside from all the talk about money and the future of baseball, my biggest reason for wanting the Dodgers to lose is a simple one: I’m tired. I’m tired of watching the same teams top the standings year after year, and I’m exhausted from watching this particular team cruise through the playoffs like it’s nothing. I need a hero — and I’m praying that it’s Toronto.

Maybe one day, I’ll look back on the days of the Dodger dynasty and realize just how much history I was watching. Maybe I’ll even feel grateful to have witnessed one of the all-time great baseball teams with my own eyes.

For now, however … Blue Jays in 4. I’ll see you all back here in two weeks — either living my best life or ready to burn my favorite sport to the ground.

Bennett Christofferson is a junior writing about baseball’s biggest stories and controversies in his column “Dugout Diaries,” which runs every other Thursday. He is also a sports editor at the Daily Trojan.