Flooding the field after Sunday’s 13-4 win over the Rays to clinch the division on the final day of the season, the Blue Jays were right where they expected to be all along. They were just the only ones who saw this coming.
Widely projected to be a team we’d all stop talking about in August when the season began, the Blue Jays now plow into October as the No. 1 seed in the AL with a legitimate shot at this organization’s first World Series since 1993, a title run that only a handful of these players were alive for. The Blue Jays have shocked the rest of baseball in ‘25, though, and for the first time in a decade, the division is theirs.
The Orioles and Rays? They walked the path many expected the Blue Jays to be on, disappointments in the same vein of this Blue Jays team a year ago. The Yankees and Red Sox? The longtime powerhouses in this division will now have to duke it out in the Wild Card Series to see which team takes a trip north to Toronto to begin the ALDS next Saturday, Oct. 4. In fact, as the No. 1 seed, the entire AL side of the postseason bracket will run through Toronto.
Each year, as fresh bats are pulled from their plastic sleeves and cleats crunch on the pavement for the first time, managers and executives talk about seasons like this. They talk about seasons where internal improvements steal a few more wins than everyone else expects. They talk about bounce-back seasons from aging stars. They talk about chemistry and culture, two fluff words that rarely mean much a few weeks into the season. They talk about all of the ways in which this could be their year.
There are still miles to go for this team, which hasn’t won a playoff game since 2016, but they’ve got a ticket to the dance now. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Bo Bichette still haven’t won a playoff game, either, but they’ve got this chance now, bigger and fuller of belief than ever before.
This home stretch hasn’t always featured the best of the Blue Jays, but it’s been enough. When this team is really rolling, it still feels like there’s some magic to them, this constant ability for the right people to make the right play at the right moment. Sunday, it was Alejandro Kirk, whose grand slam in the first inning will live on highlight reels for the rest of his career.
The Blue Jays just need a few more of these moments now. The AL East is theirs, the bye to the ALDS is theirs and the No. 1 seed in the American League is theirs. It’s all sitting in front of them, an opportunity that no one else saw coming.