MLB
2025 World
Series
We asked Canadians on staff from Quebec to British Columbia whether their communities are truly captivated by the American League pennant winners. Mark Blinch / Getty Images
When the Toronto Blue Jays take the field against the Los Angeles Dodgers on Friday, it will, of course, captivate the baseball world — it’ll be Game 1 of the World Series, after all. But with Canada’s lone MLB team still in the mix, does this mean that millions of fans north of the border will be paying closer attention than usual?
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While opinions about Toronto usually illicit a wide range of responses from Canadians, after George Springer hit the most city’s important home run since “Touch ’em all Joe, you’ll never hit a bigger home run in your life!” in 1993, propelling a Canadian team to perhaps its biggest non-hockey moment since the Raptors won the 2019 NBA championship, the response from citizens seemed to be universal. Canadians love the Blue Jays.
We put this theory to the test, asking Canadians on staff here at The Athletic from Quebec to British Columbia whether their communities are captivated by the American League pennant winners:
Josh Hargreaves, Scarborough — When a whistle sounds during hockey practice for a U18 A GTHL hockey team, players stop what they are doing and attentions turn toward the coach for instructions. However, on Monday evening, when I blew the whistle midway through my son’s practice in a rink in Toronto, it was to stop the drills for a different reason: Springer was at bat.
Seventeen-year-old boys rarely agree on anything, but with the Blue Jays trailing by two runs late in Game 7 of the ALCS and one of their best hitters at the plate with runners in scoring position, every player and coach on the ice was on the same page, cheering for the hometown team. Thanks to modern technology, a dozen players and three coaches gathered around a small phone held up high just in front of the penalty box at center ice. Nervous energy forced quick quips from the players’ mouths, encouraging Springer and hoping to witness a special moment. Springer did not disappoint, blasting a three-run shot into the left-field stands to give the Jays their first lead of the game.
“Springer hits dingers!” one player shouted. Others screamed, “Yes!” and “Woohoo!” They celebrated the moment as if it was their own.
Practice continued, but concentration levels on the drills were not especially high, with players circling the phone, constantly checking in on the score. When practice officially ended at 11 p.m. ET, the game was still in progress, so everyone filed into the dressing room, where equipment and skates remained on. Players and coaches watched Jeff Hoffman record the final three outs. More cheers erupted after the final pitch. The team was in agreement, maybe for the first time, all cheering for the same team.
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And it wasn’t the only time action on the rink in Toronto was paused to celebrate a big moment in the game, as seen in the clip below.
A post shared by Greater Toronto Hockey League (@gthlhockey)
Murat Ates, Winnipeg — “The Blue Jays are Canada’s team,” Manitoba’s Premier Wab Kinew told The Athletic by text.
The fact that Kinew responded so quickly conveys the passion Kinew has for Toronto’s run. To be clear, Kinew’s ties to the Blue Jays are strong — the avid baseball fan threw the ceremonial first pitch on June 27, 2017, as part of a Jays Care initiative — but the premier is not alone in his declaration.
His words were echoed by Winnipeg Jets coach Scott Arniel, speaking to reporters in Calgary on Monday night.
“We were taking peeks (at the Game 7 score) between periods and at the start of the game,” Arniel said. “That’s awesome for Canada … I’ve never been in an atmosphere like that where both hockey teams, every fan, Jet fan, Flame fan, were on their feet applauding that one, so congrats to them.”
The Saddledome in Calgary reacts to the George Springer HR in Game 7 #WANTITALL @BlueJays pic.twitter.com/jA78tqEVju
— Logan Gordon (@Fan960Logan) October 21, 2025
Anecdotally, the coffee shops and the social media accounts I follow have hopped on board the bandwagon — particularly noteworthy because I can’t imagine Jets fans cheering for the Maple Leafs if they ever made this kind of run. The Blue Jays’ run is safe to support and has become bandwagon fodder throughout Manitoba.
“This is one of those moments where sport transcends the game and becomes a part of family lore,” Kinew said. “Let’s go, Blue Jays!”
Daniel Nugent-Bowman, Edmonton — Edmontonians aren’t often fond of Toronto. Most Oilers fans can’t stand the Maple Leafs. There’s an exception when it comes to the Blue Jays. There are connections between Vancouver and Seattle, between Manitoba and Minnesota and between the Maritimes and the northeast of the United States. There’s no American team near Alberta, making the Blue Jays the rooting interest. Having nearly every game on national TV at 5 p.m. doesn’t hurt, either.
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Thomas Drance, Vancouver — There are loud, hardcore and loyal subsections of Vancouver-based Seattle Mariners fans who insist that the baseball heart of Canada’s Westernmost metropolis is contested, but Vancouver — like just about every English-speaking Canadian city — is Blue Jays country. (Editor’s note: As you will read later, French-speaking Canadian cities, too.)
That was readily apparent wherever you went about town Tuesday night. Walk around the seawall, or Granville Island, or the beaches of Kitsilano on a game day, and you’ll see Blue Jays hats, jerseys and gear at a frequency that’s spiked as the bandwagon has gained momentum across the past few weeks.
And it’s apparent at the bars, especially during the games. At the Steamworks brewery outpost on Main Street on Monday night, a group of roughly 80 Blue Jays fans sat (and stood, and paced, and drank anxiously) transfixed by the drama of Toronto’s Game 7 win.
You could feel the anxiety building as Seattle built its 3-1 lead. And the bar absolutely exploded after the Springer home run — 80-plus Vancouver-based Jays fans all on their feet, clapping and hollering, with that gut-level understanding that history had been shared.
Arpon Basu, Montreal — I walked into my neighbourhood pub on Monday night after covering the Canadiens-Sabres game, and the bartender was still a bit stunned. Game 7 of the ALCS was going up against the Canadiens game head-to-head, and normally, the pub plays the Canadiens game with the sound up on practically all their screens.
The pub has seven TVs, and on Monday night, only one of them had the Canadiens game on, and there was no sound. The sound was up for the Jays game, and it was on every other screen in the pub because that’s what the customers were there to watch. This, in Montreal, is unheard of. Especially for the Jays, since fans of the old Expos hated the Jays. The Jays voted in favor of contraction back in 2001, and Expos fans never forgot that.
But an entire generation of Montreal baseball fans has come of age without the Expos, who moved to Washington 21 years ago. And clearly, those wounds have healed. But still, even if it was just the seventh game of the Canadiens’ regular season, the thought that a Jays game would be playing on six screens and the Canadiens game on just one at a pub in Montreal has honestly never been a thing. But it is now.
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Kamila Hinkson, Montreal — Quebecers rooting for a sports team based in Toronto? It’s a proposition that seemed unlikely, say, 25 years ago. And let’s be real — we’re not talking about the Leafs.
But time is healing one specific Montreal-Toronto wound. At least, for some.
In 2001, 28 of the 30 MLB team owners voted to get rid of two teams, the Montreal Expos and Minnesota Twins, the following season. That the Toronto Blue Jays voted in favour of turfing the Expos was seen as a betrayal among some Expos fans, who either took their allegiances elsewhere once the team moved to Washington in 2004 or soured on watching MLB altogether.
In recent years, though, things have started to change. Are people simply rooting for the only Canadian team in the league? Are the Blue Jays, who came to Montreal for a few preseason games at the former home of the Expos from 2014 to 2019, forgiven? Are people who quietly adopted the Jays as their AL team now being less quiet about it? Is Alex Anthopoulos, the former Jays GM and a Montreal native, a secret Etsy witch who orchestrated this rapprochement when Toronto signed the son of Expos great Vladimir Guerrero in 2015?
Who knows? There is precedent, kind of, for this inter-Canadian metropolis sports support, though. Montrealers were out in droves watching the Toronto Raptors’ championship run in 2019. I wouldn’t be surprised if we see similar energy for the Jays.
Julian McKenzie, Ottawa — Ottawa is a fascinating city when it comes to its baseball fandom.
Many younger, newer generation fans who live in the city are Jays fans, and they celebrated when Springer hit his go-ahead three-run shot that eventually catapulted the Jays into their first World Series in more than 30 years.
But the city also has a tie to the now-defunct Expos, two hours east. Ottawa used to be home to the Lynx, a AAA farm team that housed future Expos stars such as Cliff Floyd, Rondell White, F.P. Santangelo and Canadian baseball legend Matt Stairs. Some holdovers appreciate the Expos, too.
When the World Series begins Friday, I’d expect Jays fandom to sweep the city, too. But that’s as far as it goes for Ottawa, which still views Toronto as an evil empire through their hockey rivalry.
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