Blue Jays fuel citywide buzz as Maple Leafs drift into indifference

On their way to an exhilarating October run that took them to Game 7 of the World Series and the brink of an incredible and unlikely championship, the Blue Jays were undeniably Canada’s team.

Coast-to-coast audiences united in supporting the success story of the country’s lone Major League Baseball franchise and its near miss against the defending champion Los Angeles Dodgers.

But are the Jays on their way to becoming the most popular Toronto franchise regardless of any pro sport? Are they already there?

Certainly in the moment, with the NHL’s Maple Leafs reeling due to losses in five of their past six games and once again at the bottom of the Atlantic Division, it has been a while since the anger and skepticism around the team has been this deep-rooted.

The Jays? They can do no wrong right now, apparently.

The high from the extended playoff run — something Leafs fans have craved for decades now — has remained in place through the first two months of baseball’s protracted offseason and the Jays ambitious approach to improving.

Under the guidance of once beleaguered general manager Ross Atkins, the Jays are having a robust offseason to match and build upon the regular season and playoff successes.

The Leafs? They can do nothing right, apparently.

As the losses pile up and the solutions feel more and more distant, the consumer vitriol seems to have become more amplified and pronounced. Fans are angry, frustrated and perhaps even worse, indifferent.

As the Athletic reported last week, this season the Leafs have sold out only six of their first 20 home games. The per-game average of 18,607 is the lowest since the Leafs moved into Scotiabank Arena, two COVID seasons excluded.

Is that a crisis? Not yet, but in a world where marketing and fan engagement are important drivers of revenue, it has to be a troubling sign for a franchise that not so long ago sold out every game for a decade.

The Jays don’t sell out each of their contests — few baseball teams do — but since Canada Day it sure felt like it. With a full house of 44,000 plus, the baseball team not only has twice the capacity the Leafs have available, but double the inventory thanks to 81 home games.

It’s unlikely the Jays will sell out all of those dates in 2026, but given that Toronto baseball fans tend to purchase tickets based on the previous season’s results, so expect there to be plenty of Blue Jays tickets in Christmas stockings this week.

Love is fleeting

It is the fickle nature (and right) of sports fans to change their sentiments in a heartbeat. A year ago, may we remind you, the Jays were coming off a 74-win, last-place season with everyone from manager John Schneider to general manager Ross Atkins and CEO Mark Shapiro seemingly on the hot seat.

Today, the popularity of the once-polarizing pair of execs has never been higher in this market as the team continues to spend this off-season with the vision and determination to prove coming within two outs of a World Series win last month wasn’t an outlier.

Where were the Leafs 12 months ago today?

With a record of 21-11-2, coach Craig Berube’s team was second in the Atlantic Division, trailing only the eventual repeat Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers. There was still hope that Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander and company could elevate to a team capable of making a sustained playoff run.

Now there’s only anger and frustration as the team prepares for its last game prior to the Christmas break, a Tuesday matinee against the Pittsburgh Penguins.

If things don’t turn in a hurry, the current icy relationship between the team and its fan base will only deepen.

Who needs tickets?

While falling a few hundred seats shy of a sellout over a handful of games is far from a crisis, it certainly has to be viewed as a troubling sign to the Maple Leafs and their new corporate overlords.

As ticket prices continue to soar and season-ticket holders have difficulty off-loading the premium-priced games in their packages, will the pushback grow stronger? And is there a breaking point?

Perhaps we’ll find out, but such is the historic popularity of the franchise that we wouldn’t expect it to be profound.

The Jays, however, seem to do no wrong in this area. Rogers jacks up ticket prices and they still sellout virtually every game, at 44,000 plus. Rogers hikes the price of Sportsnet+ packages to capitalize on the team’s playoff push and TV ratings go through the roof.

Through some bold marketing, smart renovations and the creation of a winning, engaging product, the Blue Jays are the hottest ticket in town.

The Maple Leafs, through perceived indifference, a tired, uninspired look most nights and a losing, less-than engaging show are considerably less so. When apathy seeps into a fan base and the product generates more frustration than fun, it often has an effect on business.

For decades, it seemed the Maple Leafs were immune to such concerns. Perhaps that’s no longer the case.

Last to first, first to last

Nothing fires up a fan base more than going from last to first and nothing polarizes said fandom more than spiralling down the opposite path.

With the Jays, the attraction was made even stronger in 2025 by the way it happened and that much of the team’s success felt personality driven.

From July 1 on, when the Jays swept the hated Yankees to assume first place in the division, it was a love-in that grew by the end of the season and then exploded through playoff series against those same Yankees, the Seattle Mariners and eventually the Dodgers. When such a turnaround is unexpected, the allure runs that much deeper.

Played such as Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette, George Springer, Ernie Clement and more seemed so engaging that the fan adulation came naturally. Fans resonated to those personalities and couldn’t get enough of them.

We’re currently witnessing the opposite emotions around the Leafs fan base. A listless power play, indifferent effort on many nights and what seems like a disconnect between players and coaches couldn’t be in more stark contrast to the most attractive (and successful) qualities that the Jays rode to such success.

Spring forward

If you think the love-hate relationship of the respective fan bases are at a fevered level of disparity now, fast forward two, three and four months in the calendar.

Let’s start with the second week of February, when the Jays are to report to Dunedin, Fla. for spring training to begin preparing for a defence of just the third American League pennant in franchise history.

There is nothing like the inherently positive spring training narrative to put some shine on a franchise, legit or otherwise. For six weeks, the best-shape-of-my-life storylines dominate and, for a team like the Jays already basking in the love of a fan base, the bloom will only get more vibrant. It’s guaranteed to spill into the regular season, which will be one of the most anticipated in franchise history.

Barring a turnaround in both style of play and results, the frustration only will build around the Leafs. Furthermore, when the Jays open the doors to spring training, the NHL Olympic shutdown will be in place, further shoving Toronto’s hockey team out of the spotlight. Of course, that might be a good thing if the Leafs continue to spiral on their current trajectory.

Moving on to the end of March, the Jays will be raising banners at the Rogers Centre while the Leafs could be playing out the string on a season gone nowhere.

In other words, the disparity Toronto sports fans are feeling right now could be even larger by then.

Star Power

There’s no denying that Matthews is one of the faces of the NHL and the cornerstone of the Maple Leafs franchise since he was drafted first overall by the team in 2016 — yes, almost a full decade ago.

The infatuation was strong in the early days and, in fairness, through most of Matthews’ tenure with the Leafs that has included his ascendency to team captain.

Beyond the winning though, one of the biggest attractions fans have to their superstars is in their personality. Where Matthews can be portrayed as distant and aloof at times — right or wrong — Guerrero Jr. has an electric and engaging personality that feeds into a team’s fandom.

Even when there was frustration with Guerrero’s struggles — especially early this season — fans gravitated to the all-star first baseman. And when Guerrero was on fire during the post-season, he became the toast of the town.

Guerrero wears his passion on his sleeve, has repeatedly professed his love for Canada and while playing to the crowd gets plenty of that love back.

Matthews, a different personality, is much more difficult to get a read on and thus, in some cases, more difficult to embrace. Whether that’s fair or not is up for debate, but there’s little doubt which of the two superstars top Toronto approval ratings today.

Presidential Suite

Under the shifting corporate structure of the Rogers sports empire, will there be a restructuring of franchise leadership within the Leafs and the rest of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment?

While it’s a little early for that, the action around the presidential suites of both franchises will be interesting to monitor.

With the Jays, president and CEO Mark Shapiro was just given a five-year extension to remain at the helm, further entrenching the faith Rogers chairman Ed Rogers has in both his business acumen and ability to build a winner.

The Jays continue to aggressively spend at the top end of the free-agent market with what feels like bottomless resources. From the extensive renovations to the Rogers Centre and the team’s Dunedin facilities, to the $500-million US contract given to Guerrero in April to the $270 million the team has spent on free agents already this winter, the trust from Rogers headquarters to Blue Jays Way is at an all-time high.

Less is known about the relationship between Rogers (the man) and Keith Pelley, the president and CEO of MLSE, which is now part of the burgeoning Rogers (the company) sports empire.

Pelley, with proven leadership success in many sporting arenas, has maintained he was brought here to win and intends to follow that mandate, which will be music to Rogers’ years.

TV Timeout

Both the Blue Jays and Maple Leafs consistently have been the envy of teams in their respective leagues for their flourishing television ratings.

The Leafs still draw extremely well, both as the jewel of Hockey Night in Canada and as the ratings driver through regional rights packages on both Sportsnet and TSN.

The Blue Jays, meanwhile, are a record-setting ratings wagon when it comes to viewership.

The World Series Game 7 loss to the Dodgers made broadcast history in this country (according to team broadcaster and the Rogers-owned Jays partner, Sportsnet) with 10.9 million Canadian viewers tuning in on Sportsnet and City TV.

The network said that number made it the most-watched English-language broadcast in the country outside of the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. For the seven-game series, the Jays and Dodgers averaged 7.5 million viewers on Canadian TV and the regular-season finale, in which the Jays wrapped up first in the AL East, drew 2.35 million.

By comparison, the all-Canadian first-round playoff series between the Leafs and Ottawa Senators averaged 3.2 million viewers. Meanwhile, the seven-game Stanley Cup final between the Panthers and Edmonton Oilers had an average audience of 3.8 million viewers on CBC and Sportsnet.

When (if?) the Leafs ever make that deep of a playoff fun — as distant as that seems in the moment — those numbers would double and then some. But would they match the magic of the Blue Jays memorable October? Will we ever find out?

Speculation central

After a listless 0-3 trip in which the best thing that could be said about the Leafs is that the tried hard in the finale of those games, a 5-1 loss to the Stars in Dallas, fans are calling for heads.

Anyone’s head.

Naturally, that leads to speculation about the future of Berube, rash conclusions that it’s time to blow things up and any doom-and-gloom scenario imaginable.

Speculation around the Jays is rampant as well, it’s just considerably more palatable for fans when the debate centres on whether the team will land free-agent stars like Bo Bichette or Kyle Tucker.

Atkins, once the whipping boy of Toronto sports fans, is suddenly the toast of the season.

Leafs counterpart Brad Treliving is now the man on the hot seat. What a difference a year makes in the fickle fortunes attached to the two iconic sports franchises of the city.