Stephen Staley: When the Blue Jays win, Toronto feels alive again

There was a time when Toronto felt like a city on the rise. Every new tower seemed to promise prosperity, every new restaurant or festival a sign of urban confidence. But walk through the city now, and it does not feel richer. It feels grittier, more decayed. The traffic, impossibly, is worse. Drugs and petty crime are everywhere. It is less safe, less clean, and less friendly. Toronto has all the makings of a great city, but increasingly feels like one that has lost its nerve. A city that once built the world’s tallest building now cannot seem to fill a pothole. That is why the Blue Jays matter more than they should. A baseball team cannot fix a city, but sometimes it can remind it what it feels like to be alive. When the Jays are winning playoff games, Toronto finds its pulse again. The downtown hums. The bars fill. The skyline glows blue. For a few hours each night, and in countless cold and monotonous meetings the next day, we feel connected with each other. Strangers act like neighbours. The Jays do not just play baseball; they animate the city’s spirit. A city that cheers together, even briefly, remembers that it still belongs to itself. I remember exactly where I was when José Bautista flipped his bat. It was partway through Prime Minister Harper’s stump speech at a GTA rally in 2015. I watched the swing on my phone, criminally jealous of colleagues who’d snuck down to the game, trying to stifle a cheer as the crowd around me focused on politics. Even so, the air in the city that night felt different. You could sense that something seismic had happened, that everyone was feeling the same thing at once. That was a decade ago, and Toronto was a different place. There was a sense of momentum, of possibility. The city still believed in itself. Now it feels tired, brittle, and cynical. The optimism that once defined the city has curdled into irritation. The skyline kept growing, but the spirit beneath it began to shrink. And yet, for the first time in years, something is stirring again. When Vladimir Guerrero Jr. launched that grand slam this past Sunday, the reaction felt electric in a way that Toronto rarely feels anymore. That feeling echoed Wednesday night with the Jays’ decisive series-clinching win. It helped that it came against the New York Yankees, the biggest team in baseball and perhaps in all of sports. Beating the so-called Evil Empire gave the moment a defiant, almost moral edge. You could hear the bars erupt, the streets buzz, the city roar. Sports should not matter this much, we are told. They are often dismissed as distractions from the things that truly count: politics, policy, art, or the endless work of self-improvement. And it is true that fandom can become absurd, even unhealthy. Some people build their identities around the fortunes of a team, or treat every loss as a personal slight. Yet that is not the whole story. A game can also be something larger, even noble. It can be a rare reminder that joy, loyalty, and shared purpose still exist. Politics divides by principle; sports unite by instinct. In an age that constantly preaches detachment, it is no small thing to care about something together. Toronto’s cultural life has become fragmented. Everyone watches different shows, listens to different music, scrolls through their own algorithmic feed. Even the old shared events —the Ex, TIFF, the Santa Claus Parade—now feel more like photo ops than civic moments. We have community without communion. We live shoulder to shoulder and yet worlds apart. That is what makes teams like the Jays, Leafs, and Raptors special. Each has its own rhythm and aura. The Leafs are the pinnacle of Toronto sports, and with them, both hope and heartbreak spring eternal. The Raptors gave us our most recent triumph, that remarkable moment of collective euphoria in 2019 when the city flooded the square formerly known as Yonge-Dundas after the championship, and strangers hugged like lifelong friends. The Jays, meanwhile, carry a quieter kind of faith. Their story stretches across generations, from Bell and Carter to Bautista and Guerrero. Baseball’s slower rhythm suits Toronto’s temperament: patient, anxious, hopeful. Each team beats in its own time, but together they sustain the city’s rhythm. In a cynical age, the willingness to hope for next year is its own small act of courage. That is why these moments matter. There is something sacred about the collective emotion of sports. They cut through the noise and the cynicism. In a world of personal screens and private grievances, to shout in unison with strangers is almost an act of civic liturgy. It is the same impulse that draws people to parades, community centres, and concerts: the need to belong to something larger than ourselves. G.K. Chesterton once wrote that “the man who lives in a small community lives in a much larger world.” He meant that true belonging expands the soul. It makes us larger by binding us to others. For a city like Toronto, weary, cynical, and frustrated, a Blue Jays rally can be that kind of small community. Toronto needs that reminder. The civic mood has become defensive and dull. We talk about housing crises, transit failures, and affordability as if they are weather systems, inevitable and beyond repair. It is as if we have forgotten that cities are built by people who believe in them. A baseball team cannot solve any of those problems, but it can briefly awaken the will to try. For once, the headlines belong to something joyful. That alone feels like progress. Maybe that is why the Bautista bat flip endures as more than a sports highlight. It was a declaration that Toronto could be electric, even defiant. It was not polite. It was not self-conscious. It was joy with teeth. Guerrero’s soaring grand slam was more exuberant and less angry, but it carried the same current: a reminder that Toronto can still feel something together. Maybe that’s why it feels like it matters more now. To feel a city’s pulse quicken amid decay is a reminder that decline is not destiny. The lights at Rogers Centre, the cheers echoing down Front Street, they are proof that the story is not over, that the city’s heart still beats strong. Toronto, for all its failings, still wants to live.