Toronto Blue Jays president and CEO Mark Shapiro reiterated his desire to stay with the team but wouldn’t get into specifics about contract negotiations with Rogers.Jon Blacker/The Canadian Press
His position may well be on the endangered species list on the Toronto sports scene these days, but Blue Jays president Mark Shapiro is unequivocal in his desire to stay the course with the first-place franchise after this season.
Having watched both Brendan Shanahan and Masai Ujiri be shown the door by the Maple Leafs and Raptors respectively this summer, Shapiro, who is approaching the 10-year anniversary of his appointment at the end of the month, is also nearing the end of a five-year contract he signed at the start of 2021.
Beyond having the chance to finally win a World Series after more than three decades of working in baseball, Shapiro talked up the “pretty unique” level of empowerment he gets from team owner Rogers Communications, operating as both the head of the baseball team as well as the business side as the team’s chief executive officer.
“I’ve never been a grass-is-greener guy,” he said in his annual in-season availability, before Tuesday night’s game against the Chicago Cubs. “The appreciation for what I have, and the people that I get to work with every day, and the city that I work in, the country that I live in. Those things are drivers for me to remain here.”
First-place Blue Jays return home and size up final quarter of season
Though he wouldn’t get into specifics about contract negotiations with Rogers, he did reiterate his desire to stay, adding that Rogers chairman Edward Rogers and CEO Tony Staffieri “have been reciprocal in that desire.”
Given the bounceback season that the Blue Jays are having, with the team vying with the Detroit Tigers on an almost-daily basis for first place in the American League, drawing north of 41,000 fans to the renovated Rogers Centre for every home game since the all-star break, 2025 has so far been a success.
But Shapiro knows as well as anyone that sports can be a fickle mistress. As few in Toronto need reminding, reputations are cemented and legacies defined in the postseason, where his Blue Jays have gone winless in three trips over the previous five years, stuck without a series win since 2016. But success isn’t always linear, either.
With his team having gone 55-34 since the start of May, the Blue Jays have benefited from an uptick in offence brought on by the winter hiring of hitting coach David Popkins, an addition that has the Jays in first place in the majors in batting average at .269 before Monday’s game. The team finished 19th with a .241 average last season.
That has been underpinned by getting George Springer playing his best baseball since he signed with the Blue Jays in 2021, bounceback years from shortstop Bo Bichette and catcher Alejandro Kirk, and a breakout campaign from infielder Addison Barger.
Blue Jays shortstop Bo Bichette leads the majors in hits with 147 before Tuesday’s games and has been a key part to his team’s resurgence this season.David Zalubowski/The Associated Press
All of those things have proved a pleasant surprise to Shapiro, filling him with optimism for what could be a deep run into October.
“I think we’re capable of winning the last game played, which is ultimately the goal,” he said. “Again, we have to be playing our best baseball at the right time for that to happen.
“But that’s a reality for every team and the nature of playoffs. There is some randomness, as much as people don’t want to hear that, to the postseason in every sport, and it does involve and necessitate that we play our best at the right time.”
Bichette’s success – he led the majors in hits with 147 before Tuesday’s games, more than double his forgettable 2024 total – leads to the question of whether he can be re-signed heading into free agency this winter.
“I’m confident that at the right time, we’ll make an effort to, but this isn’t the right time,” he said. “Right now the focus is on the team on the field for both Bo and for us.”
Part of the Jays’ success this year in leaving behind a last-place finish in 2024 was a collective organizational approach to owning that failure, Shapiro said, whether it occurred on the field, in the dugout, or in the front office. Everyone has moved on, with Shapiro praising the work that both general manager Ross Atkins and manager John Schneider have done to build the foundation for this year’s success.
Off the field, the recent ballpark renovations have paid dividends, with Toronto in the running to play host to MLB’s All-Star Game for the first time since 1991. Shapiro hopes to get clarity on that “within the next six to eight months.”
Cathal Kelly: Risk-averse Blue Jays strike out when it comes to creating hysteria
In the meantime, the Blue Jays have to contend with the possibility of adopting a six-man rotation for the stretch drive with the seemingly imminent callup of former AL Cy Young Award winner Shane Bieber, a trade deadline acquisition from Cleveland.
Shapiro, unsurprisingly, is unflustered.
“What seems like a problem today might not be a problem tomorrow,” he said. “We’ll figure that out at the time it comes to make a decision, but I’ll take adding a top-of-the-rotation starter to an existing good rotation any day of the week.”
Besides, there is the enticing carrot of the first deep playoff run in this city since 2016, Shapiro’s first full season with the team. With Jays fever starting to grip Toronto in a way that hasn’t been seen since that era, which culminated in back-to-back American League Championship Series appearances, there is every reason to be excited.
But as Shapiro knows only too well from when his 2007 Cleveland team – which entered the playoffs tied for the best record in the American League – you only get so many opportunities to win the big one.
“If you’ve been there and you’ve had a 3-1 lead in the ALCS, and you’ve watched that evaporate, and the team that you lost to go on and win the World Series, which I’ve experienced, then you recognize just how difficult it is to get back there again,” he said. “When you have a chance to get there, you fight to take advantage of that chance.”