Today in Blue Jays history: The first ever Blue Jays game

43 Years Ago Today

The Blue Jays played their first-ever game: April 7, 1977 at Exhibition Stadium in Toronto. If you are old enough to remember Exhibition Stadium, you’ll remember it was a terrible place to watch a baseball game. The Argonauts played their CFL games there so seats didn’t face the diamond, you had to turn your head to watch the play. They made some improvements there as time went on, but Skydome was a huge improvement

It was cold. The official game temperature was 0 C, but there was wind and a little snow. It would have seemed colder sitting in those stands. The Jays won the game 9-5 beating the White Sox.Jays’ starting pitcher, Bill Signer, didn’t have a good start, 4.1 innings, 10 hits, 3 walks, 5 k but surprisingly only allowed 4 runs, 3 earned. He was at the end of a pretty good 14 year career. He won 20 games for the Dodgers, back in 1969, but would finish with a 6.79 ERA in 1977, his last season. Jerry Johnson pitched 2.2 in relief and got the win. Pete Vuckovich pitched the last two innings, for the save. He allowed one hit and one walk, with 3 strikeouts. Two inning saves weren’t such a bit deal back then. Vuckovich would go on to win the Cy Young award in 1982 as a Brewer.

On offense, Doug Ault hit two home runs and drove in 4, a surprising performance for a guy that only had 17 career homers in 256 major league games. Al Woods had a pinch-hit, 2 run homer. Woods played 7 years with the Jays. He had a pretty good season in 1980, hitting .300/.364/.480 with 15 home runs, but, other than that year, he was pretty forgettable.

The Jays had 16 hits, on the day, 3 each for Ault and second baseman Pedro Garcia. Two each for Dave McKay (the lone Canadian in the lineup), Otto Velez and Rick Cerone. Velez and Cerone were the two best players in the lineup. Cerone played for 18 years, and made it to the World Series, with the Yankees, in 1981. Velez played 11 seasons, mostly at DH, and, in 1980, hit 20 home runs, for the Jays.

The Jays would only win 53 more games that year. They did have a couple of other decent players: Ron Fairly led the team with 19 home runs and tied for the lead in RBI, with Ault, at 64. Alan Ashby caught 124 games. Roy Howell was a rookie and played 96 games, mostly at 3B. For the most part, we had a bunch of players that the other teams didn’t want.

Dave Lemanczyk led the staff with 13 wins (throwing 252 innings). Jerry Garvin, who would become a pretty good lefty reliever, won 10 games (losing 18) with a 4.19 ERA. Vuckovich led the team with 8 saves.

We’d finish last in the AL East for the first 5 years of our existence and it would take until our 7th season until we would have our first winning season.