Baseball
Baseball was popular in the city at the minor league level since the 1890s with the Toronto Maple Leafs. It was in a game against the Leafs on September 5, 1914 at Hanlan's Point Stadium where Babe Ruth hit his first ever professional home run while also pitching a complete game one-hitter for the visiting Providence Grays. Hall of famer Sparky Anderson was also a member of the Leafs as both a player and a manager. In 1967, the Leafs relocated out of Toronto into Louisville, Kentucky.
In January 1976, San Francisco Giants owner Horace Stoneham agreed to sell the team for $13.25 million to a group intending to relocate it to Toronto. The team would have began play in the 1976 season at Exhibition Stadium, and be called the Toronto Giants. However the plan to move the Giants was quashed by a U.S. court. Big-league baseball would finally come to Toronto with Major League Baseball expansion in 1976. The Toronto Blue Jays commenced operation in 1976, and first contested matches in the inaugural 1977 campaign. Although the team performed poorly, placing last in the American League East for each of its first three years, successful drafting and team management resulted in improved performance that led to the team's first pennant in 1985, and culminated with consecutive World Series victories in 1992 and 1993.
When awarded the franchise, Exhibition Stadium was chosen as the site for the team's home games. Built in the 1950s, it was rebuilt in 1976 to satisfy the requirements for baseball. In 1989, the team moved to the newly built SkyDome (now known as the Rogers Centre).
The city is also home to the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball club of the Intercounty Baseball League.
Toronto has also hosted parts of the 2009 World Baseball Classic.
Read more about this topic: Sport In Toronto
Famous quotes containing the word baseball:
“When Dad can’t get the diaper on straight, we laugh at him as though he were trying to walk around in high-heel shoes. Do we ever assist him by pointing out that all you have to do is lay out the diaper like a baseball diamond, put the kid’s butt on the pitcher’s mound, bring home plate up, then fasten the tapes at first and third base?”
—Michael K. Meyerhoff (20th century)
“The salary cap ... will be accepted about the time the 13 original states restore the monarchy.”
—Tom Reich, U.S. baseball agent. New York Times, p. 16B (August 11, 1994)
“Baseball is the religion that worships the obvious and gives thanks that things are exactly as they seem. Instead of celebrating mysteries, baseball rejoices in the absence of mysteries and trusts that, if we watch what is laid before our eyes, down to the last detail, we will cultivate the gift of seeing things as they really are.”
—Thomas Boswell, U.S. sports journalist. “The Church of Baseball,” Baseball: An Illustrated History, ed. Geoffrey C. Ward, Knopf (1994)