Baseball is America’s pastime, but north of the border, one team has captivated an entire nation: the Toronto Blue Jays.
The Blue Jays eliminating the rival Yankees — long our large-market divisional tormentor — was cause for jubilation across the nation.
According to Rogers Sportsnet, viewership for Game 7 of the Blue Jays-Mariners American League Championship Series peaked at 8.3 million Canadians in the moments leading to the final out. That’s almost 20% of the country glued to their screens, cheering on Canada’s team. Unlike in the United States, where fan bases are highly regionalized, the Blue Jays’ reach across Canada spans far and wide. Fandom isn’t just concentrated in Toronto; it stretches from coast to coast — a claim no other MLB franchise can make.
The Blue Jays won consecutive World Series in 1992 and 1993, but since then, Canada has been mostly devoid of professional titles among the big four sports. Outside of an NBA championship by the Toronto Raptors in 2019, Canada hasn’t been home to a world title since the Blue Jays won in 1993 — with the Montreal Canadiens’ Stanley Cup victory that same year.
In the 32 years since, the Blue Jays have experienced plenty of heartache, including two decades without a playoff berth between 1994 to 2014. Since Joe Carter’s series-clinching home run in Game 6 of the 1993 World Series, the closest the team has come was consecutive ALCS defeats in 2015 and 2016.
But Canada’s team is back, having rebounded from a last-place finish in the American League East last year to capture its first division title in 10 years. Along the way to the Fall Classic, it roundly defeated its division rival New York Yankees, then the Seattle Mariners in an epic seven-game series. Now the Blue Jays will face off against baseball’s biggest juggernaut: the defending champion Los Angeles Dodgers, who at least on paper look even better than last year’s team.
While expectations were low heading into this year’s regular season, the underdog Jays actually have their fans believing this could be their year.
While we might not be as extreme as sports fans in Philadelphia — where city officials feel they have to grease the phone poles prior to major sporting events — don’t be fooled by our inherently polite Canadian nature: We’re die-hard Blue Jays fans through and through. Yes, Jays fans did storm the streets of Toronto earlier this week to celebrate the club’s return to the World Series, and some even climbed light poles — but they did it politely, safely, sometimes while belting out the Canadian national anthem.
Blue Jays fans are no strangers to anguish in the three-plus decades since the last World Series.
Besides stuffing thousands upon thousands of hot dogs down our collective gullets during $1 hot dog games (more than 826,000 hot dogs were consumed during “Loonie Dog Night” every Tuesday at Rogers Centre over the course of the regular season), Toronto is known for its seventh inning stretch, which includes a song and dance to the anthem “OK Blue Jays.” Played just before the ballpark classic “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” “OK Blue Jays” gets fans out of their seats every time. The song became so popular in the 1980s that it was released as a single and sold well enough to be awarded gold record status.
And a who’s who of Canadian celebrity Blue Jays fans are often seen in the best seats at Rogers Centre — whether it’s Rush frontman Geddy Lee, “Schitt’s Creek” star Eugene Levy, Finn Wolfhard from “Stranger Things,” Michael Bublé or Toronto’s own The Weeknd.
It’s a rite of passage for many from the Atlantic provinces in Eastern Canada to support the team on the road for East Coast games in cities like New York and Boston, and for Canadians from Western Canada to invade cities like Minnesota and Seattle. This national pride was loud and clear during the regular season and the Blue Jays’ first two series of the postseason. Fans will travel more than 1,000 miles (though we go by kilometers) to see their team on the road. Chants of “Let’s go Blue Jays” rang from both Yankee Stadium in New York and T-Mobile Park in Seattle during the postseason.
The Blue Jays eliminating the rival Yankees — long our large-market divisional tormentor — was cause for jubilation across the nation. Rallying to defeat the Mariners after facing an 0-2 deficit in the ALCS set off a tidal wave of joy in Canada for generations of baseball fans.
Blue Jays fans are no strangers to anguish in the three-plus decades since the last World Series. For some, it’s made for bitter cynicism, as they wait for the other shoe to drop. But for others who are eternally optimistic, this is the time for their beloved birds to shine on the grandest stage of them all: the bright lights of October. Go Jays.