History of the Toronto Blue Jays

The Toronto Blue Jays joined Major League Baseball as an expansion team in 1976, set to begin play in the American League the following year. Toronto had been linked to big-league baseball since the 1880s, and the city had hosted the International League’s Toronto Maple Leafs from 1896 to 1967. In January 1976, the San Francisco Giants nearly moved north after owner Horace Stoneham agreed to sell the club to a Canadian group that included Labatt Breweries, The Globe and Mail’s Howard Webster, and the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. That group planned to rename the team the Toronto Giants and play at Exhibition Stadium, but a court ruling blocked the move, and the Giants stayed put. Toronto’s drive for an MLB team didn’t fade, and it paid off later that year when the American League expanded—partly to balance the league after Seattle was granted a new franchise following a lawsuit over the loss of the Pilots.

The new Toronto franchise cost $7 million. Its name came from a contest that drew more than 4,000 entries; “Blue Jays” was chosen because it fit Toronto’s tradition of using blue in team colors and nodded to Labatt Blue, the flagship beer of the majority owner. The first employee hired was Paul Beeston, who started as vice president of business operations. Before the 1977 season, Peter Bavasi became president and Pat Gillick assistant general manager. The Blue Jays played their first game on April 7, 1977, beating the Chicago White Sox in a snowstorm. That win kicked off a stretch of early struggles, but the team gradually improved, notching its first winning season in 1983. Under manager Bobby Cox, they won their first American League East title in 1985. The late 1980s and early 1990s, managed by Cito Gaston, brought multiple division titles and back-to-back World Series championships in 1992 and 1993—the first won by a team based outside the United States. Key players in that era included Roberto Alomar, Joe Carter, and Dave Stieb.

After the mid-1990s strike, the Blue Jays hit a downturn but saw stars like Roy Halladay and Carlos Delgado emerge. A brief revival came in the late 1990s with the addition of Roger Clemens. In the early 2000s, general manager J.P. Ricciardi led a rebuild that produced a competitive team by the mid-2000s. The 2010s brought a resurgence, with playoff runs in 2015 and 2016 powered by José Bautista and Josh Donaldson.