The Athletic has live coverage of Dodgers vs. Blue Jays in Game 7 of the 2025 World Series.
Friday night during Game 6 of the World Series, umpire Jordan Baker was not on the field, but he was still in full uniform. As the alternate, he was likely somewhere in the tunnels of the Rogers Centre, ready in case he was called upon to sub in.
But Saturday night, for the first World Series Game 7 since 2019, he will be behind the plate, calling the biggest game of his career. A game that, no matter what happens, will be one of the biggest in this sport’s history.
It’s both an honor and an unenviable task. A career achievement, but also a Pandora’s box where one mistake can come to overshadow everything you’ve accomplished.
Dale Scott was a big-league umpire for 32 years, when he umped three World Series, including Game 7 of the 2001 Fall Classic. He retired from the profession in 2017, but if anyone knows what it’s like to be Jordan Baker, it’s Dale Scott.
The Athletic spoke with Scott for a Q&A about his Game 7 experience, the preparation, nerves and mindset required to rise to the occasion. Here’s what he said about the challenge.
This interview has been lightly edited for clarity and length.
Where were you stationed for Game 7 in 2001?
Game 7, I was at second base. On the game-winning hit, I’m in that highlight every single time because it basically was an infield fly.
When you see that replay of the Luis Gonzalez walk-off single — a hit we’ve all seen a million times — are you looking at this seminal baseball moment? Or is it, “Oh, look, there I am!”
A little bit of both. It was such an impossible — I mean, they did it off of Mariano (Rivera). I don’t think he’s ever done that. It was so insane. It’s like the media or fans or anything, when you build a series up, and all of a sudden, now the right team wins Game 6 to force a Game 7, you’re reaching the peak, man. The buildup is so immense for something like that.
Game 6 in that particular series was a blowout. The Diamondbacks won like 15-2 or something like that, something stupid. So we knew we were going to a Game 7 really early the night before. It’s definitely a buildup to, “There’s no more games after this. This is it.”
That’s an amazing amount of pressure. Any time you’re working a big series like that. But it’s amazing when you walk on the field thinking, “My God.” You don’t have time, at the time, to think about the history. You’re actually on the field when this happens. When George W. Bush threw out the first pitch and that kind of stuff.
But when it’s over, you can sit back and go, “Man, that was crazy.”
You appreciate the history more years later?
A lot of people say, “Did you have fun at the World Series?” “Well, I don’t know if fun is the right word.” You have fun it’s over, and you didn’t get crucified.
With no replay, there’s more pressure going into a game like that than there might be today.
There’s no correcting anything. You don’t think of (replay) as a safety net, because you’re striving to get every call right. But there is truth to the fact that if you do kick something in a really bad time, it can be corrected. And usually, as we’ve seen in replay in any type of game, once it’s corrected, a lot of time it’s not even mentioned. The call eventually got called right. Maybe we looked bad doing it, but we got it called right. And that’s all people want, so you just move on.
What’s it like waking up in the morning for a Game 7? What are the hours like as it gets closer?
You try to, at least I did, you try to do a normal routine, knowing there was nothing normal about it. But you always hear the saying, “Do what got you there.” You work a zillion games during the season, so why change it up all of a sudden when it’s Game 7? You just try to approach it as you do other games. But you’d be lying to say you don’t understand the situation.
This was in Phoenix. Because I go to Phoenix every year for spring training and everything else, I have a lot of friends in Phoenix. I had lunch with them that day. But the whole time, you have this kind of buzz in your mind, this underlying little buzz. It’s not occupying your brain every second. But it’s just there, because you know what’s happening that night. As an umpire, you’re just hoping that things go well. And not only myself, but anybody on that crew, you hope nobody has a controversial situation. This is it, it’s such a microscope. Your margin of error is pretty low; it’s thin.
For me, anyway, in the back of your mind, you know what’s happening. You know what day this is. It’s all going to end that night. In my situation, we had no weather issues because we’re in a dome. You don’t have any of that stuff or have that seep in. You just approach it like you do any game, while knowing full well that it’s not a normal game.
Do the six umpires get together before the game? What’s the conversation like?
The conversation that we have when the six of us get together is before Game 1. That’s when you talk about any rotations you might have or any situations. If something happens during the Series, you will talk about it. But by Game 7, we know what we’re supposed to do. We know where we’re going when the ball’s hit here or the runner’s here, or whatever. There really isn’t a lot of that discussion because it’s already been done. And you’ve already worked six games in a six-man crew.
Every guy approaches a plate game differently. Some guys are very quiet. Some guys are real talkative. Everybody has their own routine and their own way of doing it. Steve Rippley was the home plate umpire, the crew chief. That’s when we only worked six guys, so he had Game 1 on the plate, and now he has Game 7. He was a National League guy, I was an American League guy. Hadn’t worked with him hardly at all, outside of a little bit in Triple A years ago. But I’m going to stay clear of him. I’m not going to BS with him, unless he brings it up.
It’s kind of like a starting pitcher.
Yes. Some guys, they have butterflies or are nervous. They just talk all the time before a big plate game. I just read his mood or demeanor, and deal with that whichever way. Going into that locker room for Game 7, I was just thinking if Steve’s real talkative and BS-ing, I’ll BS with the best of them. But if he’s pretty quiet and in his own mind, then I’ll steer clear of him and let him prepare whatever way he does.
Not everyone gets to be a part of something that transcends history. But you did. How much lifelong pride is there in calling this game?
That sums it up. I remember my third and my last World Series was in 2004. When the Red Sox broke the streak. That was the 100th World Series, and I even had that engraved on the inside of my ring. I thought to myself, “My God, the 100th World Series” and I have been so fortunate to be a part of three of them. Growing up in Eugene, Ore., when I first started umpiring, I never dreamed that I would be on the field for a World Series. Obviously, I knew I wouldn’t be on the field as a player. I knew that pretty early.
But even through my career as you try to get to the big leagues and everything, you knew that it was out there if you could make it and continue on. There is a sense of history. A lot of that is after the fact. A lot of that is when I am off the bubble. Off the Hubble telescope, where everything is looked at and dissected.
To be able to say, “Wow, I was part of that.” When you get your first World Series, your first ring, nobody can take that away from you. No matter whatever happens the rest of your career, they can’t take away that, because you were a part of it.
Jordan Baker did not ump Game 6; he’s the alternate. But he watched in the umpire room knowing he’ll get the plate if there is a Game 7. What’s that like?
The alternate is always dressed and ready to go in case somebody goes down. You have to have the mindset that it’s going to be played. Even if Toronto was winning, you can’t mentally think I’m going to get out of this, or it’s not going to happen. Until it’s not going to happen, it’s happening.
I know Jordan — it’s impossible not to have that nervous energy knowing that in 24 hours, you’re the one strapping it on and you’re the one back there getting dissected on every pitch.
Would you be rooting for Game 7? Or want to avoid the potential scrutiny altogether? You got to ump in the World Series already, why subject yourself to all the risks?
That’s the thing. You don’t dwell on that. For me, it was always in the back of my mind. I told somebody once, listen, you can prepare as much as you can prepare mentally, physically, whatever. But sometimes, s— happens, man. And you just have to deal with it. And you have to deal with it in real time, and as best you can. It may be something you did. It may be something that you didn’t do. It was a weird play, a controversial play, whatever.
For Jordan, you’re not necessarily rooting. You’re basically just taking it all in. Just trying to keep an even keel. The best advice I got early in my career was you don’t get too high and you don’t get too low, because baseball is a marathon. That time you think you got the world by the balls, that next pitch or play that you kick, all of a sudden you’re in the gutter before you know it. I’m sure Jordan, sitting in the locker room watching Game 6, was not living or dying by that game. It’s just, “I’ll be ready for tomorrow.”
