Today in Blue Jays history

I hope all you dads had a great day yesterday. Mine was good. The Jays won and we went out for a very nice supper and I got some nice presents.

Seven years ago, on Father's Day, John McDonald, after losing his father a few days before, hit a home run in his first at bat back from the bereavement list. I remember listening to the game on the radio, I was driving home from a weekend away, you could really feel the emotion of it all come through in Jerry and Alan's voices as well as their respect and love for McDonald.

Shi Davidi talks about the moment in his Big 50 book. That section makes the book worth having by itself, but the rest of the book was good too. Shi tells us that John was at visiting his dad in hospital, shortly before he passed, and he told his son “I want you to hit your next home run for me. And I want you to cross the plate and I want you to point to me.”

McDonald’s first game back, after his father’s death, was Father’s Day. It had to be a tough day for him. Then he gets in the game. late, because, we were getting thumped and that is the only way he was getting playing time at that point. And he hits a home run. It's an amazing thing, a guy with 14 home runs in his career comes up with one in his only at bat on Father's Day.

There wasn’t a dry eye anywhere.

Speaking of Father's Day, sevens year ago today, our Bluebird Banter team grew by one. Hard to believe seven years have gone by.

Eight years ago, there was a play play that we'll all remember, Marco Scutaro took a walk and continued on to second base, when he realized no one was paying attention to him. I miss Marco. I'm going to put the GIF of the play after the jump.

I was reminded of this when Jose Bautista pulled the same trick last week.