Ask just about any Toronto Blue Jays fan about their favourite Marco Estrada moment, and they’ll point to the same date on the calendar: Oct. 21, 2015.
It was Game 5 of the ALCS against the Kansas City Royals, a must-win game for Estrada & Co., who were down 3-1 in the series.
Fans will remember the absolute pitching clinic put on by the starter — he looked like he had ice in his veins, giving up just one score through eight innings — but Estrada himself will never forget what happened just afterwards, as then-manager John Gibbons sauntered out to the mound to release him from the game and call in the closer.
“I had so much fun [in Toronto], not only the games but just living in Toronto, meeting new people. It was a blast, and I’m grateful for everything,” Estrada said during an appearance on Good Show Monday, when asked about his most memorable moment in Blue Jays threads. “But I guess if I had to narrow it down to one, I wouldn’t really say the game or my outing per say, but the ovation that I got when I walked off the mound in Game 5 against the Royals. That’s something that definitely sticks out in my mind and it’s something that I’ll never forget.”
The 35-year-old pitcher’s days in Toronto are officially in the rearview mirror now, having just signed a one-year contract with the Oakland Athletics for the upcoming 2019 campaign.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever get an ovation like that again,” Estrada said. “It was insane, it was the loudest I’ve ever heard that place other than maybe Bautista’s home run. But yeah, it was a lot of fun walking off the mound, I was just trying to take it all in.”
That memorable moment was closely followed by an event most Jays fans would rather soon forget — and a feeling Estrada can’t quite shake — as they would go on to lose the following game, and with it the series.
“It still hurts,” Estrada said of that 2015 run cut short. “I’ve said this numerous times, I go back and look at the team we had and think to myself, ‘How did we not win? We were stacked.’ And it’s true, Kansas City played a heck of a game. They played a heck of a series and then just went on to dominate the World Series. In baseball, it’s just getting hot at the right time, and they were definitely hot.”
After claiming their second consecutive AL pennant, the Royals put away the New York Mets in five games and were crowned World Series champs.
“I had a dream, I woke up one day and I had a ring on my finger, and I saw everything, and I thought we were going to do it,” Estrada continued, reflecting on that series. “And Game 5 came, I pitched that game and we won and I said, ‘Oh my God, it’s going to happen, we’re going to turn this around and win the whole thing.’ And then, unfortunately, it didn’t work out that way.
“I feel like we should’ve, not easily, but we should’ve definitely won that series,” Estrada continued. “But that’s the way baseball works, you know?”
Listen to the full interview below:
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