MONTREAL — The Toronto Blue Jays’ two-game series in Montreal at the end of spring training, now in its third year running, is a great thing for the city, a great thing for the fans, and a great thing for baseball in Canada. There’s no disputing any of that. But this year, the Blue Jays would probably prefer not to be taking part.
Ironically, that’s because the team is so incredibly good. ESPN is broadcasting a trio of games this Sunday to kick off the 2016 regular season before the rest of the league opens on Monday, and the Blue Jays were a natural choice to be included. They played some of the most exciting baseball on the planet in 2015, made all kinds of noise in the playoffs, and field a video game lineup featuring feared power hitters and elite defenders all over the diamond.
But as a result of being included on opening day, the team has to make some less than ideal travel arrangements. First, they left their spring training base in Dunedin, Fla., on Thursday, flying 2,100 kilometres to Montreal for these two games against the Boston Red Sox, the first of which they dropped, 4-2, in 10 innings Friday night.
Then, on Saturday evening, they’ll get on that same plane, just flying in the opposite direction back to Florida for Sunday’s game, which starts at 4:05 pm. The team flight isn’t scheduled to land Saturday night until around 10:00 pm (and we all know flights always depart and arrive precisely on schedule), at which point the players will check in to their hotel, grab some quick sleep, and then turn around immediately for Sunday’s opener.
“There was a little bit of complaining,” Blue Jays manager John Gibbons said of his players’ reaction to the team’s less-than-optimal travel schedule. “But I don’t think it’s that big of a deal because it’s so early in the season. Everybody’s fresh and feeling good.”
There’s also the matter of the team the Blue Jays are facing in Montreal. The club certainly doesn’t want to be giving the Red Sox any more information about their hitters or pitchers than they already have at this point. Plus, Toronto’s hitters had to step in against a knuckleballer, Steven Wright, in Friday’s opener.
When Wright was scheduled to pitch against the Blue Jays earlier this spring, Gibbons held all of his regulars out of the lineup in order to avoid having their timing thrown off by chasing 73-mph junk all afternoon. But on Friday night, that wasn’t an option.
“I might not get out of here alive if we went in that direction,” Gibbons said with a laugh. “I’m sure we’ll have to face him during the season. He’s going to be in their rotation. So we might as well get used to it.”
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But in spite of all this, Blue Jays players will tell you they were thrilled to get the experience they did Friday night, and that the Montreal series also comes with some distinct benefits.
After four weeks of zombie-walking through Grapefruit League games played before meagre crowds with an average age north of 65, the two games at Olympic Stadium provide a much needed dose of exhilaration. More than 52,000 packed the oval stadium to the furthest walls of its rafters, which funneled their cheers, stomps, and seat-slams straight down toward field level.
Nothing about it felt like a spring training game, which was clear from the moment Kevin Pillar stepped into the box to lead-off for the Blue Jays Friday night and jacked the fourth pitch Wright threw into the left field seats, sending Montreal into a frenzy.
“I think I hit some balls like that in spring training and they didn’t go out, so maybe the little extra adrenaline and playing in a big-league stadium does something,” Pillar said. “It’s good to get those butterflies out of the way before opening day. It’s a really good dress rehearsal for the season.”
Last year in this series, Pillar hit a ball he thought was leaving the yard, flipping his bat and beginning his home run trot only to watch it die in the outfield and get caught at the wall. This time around, the ball Pillar struck cleared about ten rows of seats.
“Anytime you hit a home run it feels good. But to come back here and do it, get it out of the way, play that big-league feeling game in front of all these people, go up there against a knuckleballer and do that — it felt really good,” Pillar said. “It just speaks to where I was at during that time last year and where I’m at now with my strength and my swing and my understanding of what I can do.”
Canadian left fielder Michael Saunders also went deep, smoking a 3-1 Wright fastball on a rope to right-centre field for his fourth homer of the spring. He added a single to the left-centre field gap later in the game, as he continues to bulldoze through spring training, where he’s hit .318/.375/.636 in 44 at-bats.
Like Pillar, Saunders said getting the opportunity to play in Montreal’s crazed atmosphere can only help him and his teammates on the eve of the season.
“The adrenaline that I had playing in front of 52,000 really got the jitters out. I think that’s really going to help me. This felt like my opening day,” Saunders said. “Even though the wins and losses don’t matter, this was a big-league ball game today. The crowd was electric.”
Free-agent acquisition J.A. Happ started for the Blue Jays, striking out four in four innings against Boston’s best hitters, allowing just a run on four hits. He said the atmosphere at Olympic Stadium actually amped him up too far, to the point where he was being inconsistent with his mechanics and fighting to slow himself down.
Happ pitched with runners on base in all four of his innings, which can be a good thing to experience at this time of year when pitchers are trying to face as many different in-game situations as they can.
“It was a lot of fun out there today. That atmosphere was awesome. I’m really glad to get to be a part of that. It was a lot like the regular season,” Happ said. “Having that crowd really makes a difference. I had all that adrenaline. I was really excited to be out there and to get to try to harness that energy in the right way.”
So, like most things in life, these two games in Montreal are both good and bad for the Blue Jays. It’s good to get into a regular season atmosphere, to have the opportunity to be a part of something truly unique, and to go into Sunday’s opener feeling like it’s just another game. It’s bad to have to race to the airport Saturday night, and hope that Mother Nature and flight schedules cooperate to get the team back to Florida at a reasonable hour.
“Our opportunity to come here and play in Montreal and get to represent Canada in this way is extremely special,” Pillar said. “So, we’re going to do what we’ve got to do. It’s not the ideal situation but everyone’s prepared for it. If you can’t get excited for opening day, then something’s wrong with you.”