How Will Bo Bichette Be Remembered in Toronto?

[Owen Hill]

In October of 2025, Bo Bichette said that his goal was to play his entire career with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and win championships with the Blue Jays, but the Jays prioritized other offseason moves ahead of bringing him back. In January, Bo signed a massive three-year, $126 million deal with the New York Mets, ending his career with the Blue Jays.

Bichette and the Mets will come to the Rogers Centre for a three-game series on June 29 through July 1, and he will surely receive a touching tribute video and a standing ovation from the fan base that he grew up in front of.

But how is he going to be remembered in Toronto?

Heading into 2019, there wasn’t much for Blue Jays fans to be excited about other than prospect rankings. The core from the 2015 and ‘16 playoff runs had moved on, and the hype around the team had died back down to pre-2015 levels. 

The Jays were coming off back-to-back fourth-place finishes in the AL East and were destined for a similar season in 2019 with Justin Smoak as the face of their lineup, and a soon-to-be-traded Marcus Stroman as their best pitcher.

But there was light at the end of the tunnel for fans. At the top of just about any prospect list you could find was Vladimir Guerrero Jr.

The son-of-a-Hall-of-Famer, blue-chip third base prospect with generational power and an elite approach that hit .381 across Double and Triple A as a teenager was due to come up and make his debut at some point in 2019.

But throughout Guerrero's journey to the big leagues, a shortstop prospect just as important to the future of the Blue Jays was making a name for himself as Vladdy’s partner in crime.

While Vlad Jr. was headlining all of the prospect lists and generating all of the excitement, Bo Bichette was quietly developing into a star.

Bichette was a second-round draft pick of the Jays in 2016, and he opened up 2019 as the game's 11th-ranked prospect, according to MLB Pipeline. But, at just 21 years old, he wasn’t expected to be ready for a big league debut until at least 2020. That’s why it was so exciting when the trade deadline rolled around, the Jays traded away Eric Sogard to the Tampa Bay Rays, and they decided it was time to let their shortstop of the future take the big league job for a spin.

Bo met the Blue Jays in Kansas City on July 29, 2019, and picked up his first major league hit on the second pitch he saw. From the moment he stepped into the box for the first time as a Blue Jay, all he did was hit. 

It didn’t take long for Bichette to figure out he belonged in the big leagues. That first hit started an 11-game hit streak to open his MLB career, which included eight multi-hit games and his first four big league homers.

Despite the blazing start to his Blue Jays tenure, the lasting memory of Bo Bichette’s rookie season, and the moment that many baseball fans recognize as when he truly arrived, took place in Dodger Stadium, late on an August night.

The matchup was highly anticipated: the veteran superstar Clayton Kershaw against a young, up-and-coming Blue Jays team.

Bo appeared in 748 regular season games as a Blue Jay. It’s easy to forget about so many of those, even ones where he had great performances. But there aren’t a lot of Jays fans that don’t remember a rookie Bichette taking a future Hall of Famer deep twice in the same game.

It was moments like that one that propelled Bo Bichette to stardom so early in his career. He always seemed to have his most impressive performances when the lights were brightest. (Even if he looked really silly on a couple of Cooperstown curveballs in between homers.)

Bichette finished his rookie season hitting .311 with a .930 OPS across 212 plate appearances at just 21 years old, but didn’t garner any attention for Rookie of the Year because he debuted so late in the season.

The important thing was that it looked like with Bichette and Guerrero, as well as Cavan Biggio, Lourdes Gurriel Jr., Danny Jansen and Teoscar Hernández, in place for years to come, the Blue Jays had the start of a promising position player core.

On the back of that position player core, and with the big free agent addition of Hyun Jin Ryu leading the rotation, the Jays snapped a three-year playoff drought as a Wild Card team in 2020.

Bichette wound up missing about a month of the shortened season, which meant he only appeared in 29 games, but in those games, he continued to be productive at the top of the lineup, finishing with a .301 average and 120 wRC+.

The Jays would end up losing in two straight games to the eventual American League champion Tampa Bay Rays, but a new era of winning Blue Jays baseball was officially underway, with Bichette and Guerrero as the faces of it.

The 2021 Blue Jays were one of the most exciting teams in baseball. They supplemented that exciting young core with big free agent signings like George Springer and Marcus Semien, and Robbie Ray dominated en route to winning the AL Cy Young.

Those 2021 Jays had the second best offense in MLB according to wRC+. Most fans probably remember Vlad hitting 48 homers and finishing second for AL MVP behind Shohei Ohtani, or Semien setting the single-season home run record for a second baseman with 45 bombs of his own, finishing one spot behind Vlad in MVP voting.

At the time, it was the best season of Blue Jays baseball in more than half a decade.

But for the first four months of that season, the Jays had one of the biggest disadvantages in baseball. Due to COVID-related travel restrictions, the Jays were forced to use their minor league facilities as their home ballparks. They played their first two months of home games on their Single-A field in Dunedin before moving to their Triple-A field in Buffalo until the end of July.

From their final home game in 2019 to July 30, 2021, the Toronto Blue Jays did not play a game in Toronto. It was 670 excruciating days that a baseball team was taken away from its fans. So, you can imagine the emotion from both the fans and the players when the Jays were finally able to get back to where they belonged.

Throughout his career, the fans and the media have always had a hard time reading Bichette. He never had the same “wear your heart on your sleeve” disposition as his co-star Vladdy, and a lot of breath was wasted debating whether or not he truly enjoyed being a Toronto Blue Jay.

That’s why it meant so much when Bo went to The Players' Tribune to post an article titled “Toronto!!!!! We’re HOME.”

He wrote about how much he missed the city and playing for the fans during the team’s time away and how excited he was to bring playoff moments like José Bautista’s iconic bat flip back to the Rogers Centre.

His words were an emotional read at the time, and looking back on them after his departure hits just as hard.

Bichette backed up his words with a two-run bomb in the Jays' first game back, propelling them to a 6-4 win in their first game on home turf in nearly two full years.

Aside from his heart-warming tribute to Toronto, 2021 was also the year that Bo Bichette proved he was a true star.

It’s not really fair to call his third major league season a breakout, because he was so good in the first two, but if the baseball world hadn't bought into his game before, it definitely had after 2021.

Over 690 plate appearances, Bichette hit .298 with an .828 OPS, which was good for a 122 wRC+.

He led the American League in hits with 191, mashed a career high 29 homers, cashed 102 RBI and even added 25 stolen bases, earning his first career All-Star appearance. 

The Blue Jays won 91 games, and the move back home helped them finish the season as the hottest team in the sport, going 22-9 in September. Their season ended up coming down to the final day, and they missed the playoffs by a single game after the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees both won their final contests, giving them 92 wins apiece. 

The way that season ended was heartbreaking, but at just 23 years old, Bichette was already one of the league’s best offensive shortstops, and the Jays were poised to be a playoff threat for years to come.

Heading into 2022, the excitement around Blue Jays baseball was as high as it had been for an Opening Day since 2016.

Fans were finally allowed back in the ballpark at full force, and the Jays were viewed as a lock to make the playoffs and contend for the World Series.

But the road was a little bit rockier than expected. Semien had departed for Texas in free agency, Guerrero didn't quite follow up his near-MVP caliber season from the year before, and Bichette himself was very disappointing.

After a full five months of baseball, heading into September, the Jays found themselves in the third Wild Card spot, just 1.5 games up on the Baltimore Orioles. Far short of their expectations at the start of the season.

Bichette was hitting just .260 with a .725 OPS and had a wRC+ of only 107. Not bad numbers, but his 2.3 fWAR was 13th among primary shortstops through August 31. He was behind guys like Jorge Mateo and Amed Rosario.

There were serious questions about whether or not Bo was actually the player we thought he’d proven himself to be the year before, because without above-average defense at shortstop and the ability to be a well-above-league-average hitter, his value to the team wasn’t very high.

But then the calendar flipped, and the month Blue Jays fans refer to as “Septem-Bo” rolled around. 

It was one of the most impressive sustained offensive performances I can remember, and it came right when his team needed it the most.

Bichette was a man on fire in September and October of 2022, picking up 54 hits in 133 at-bats, good for a .406 average. His 1.105 OPS led shortstops that month, and his 218 wRC+ was the second best mark in the majors behind only the eventual AL MVP Aaron Judge.

He set the Blue Jays franchise record for hits in a month, and they all seemed to come in the biggest moments of games.

Bichette more than doubled his fWAR in the last month of the season, as it skyrocketed from that mediocre 2.3 to 4.8 in just 32 games.

That blazing month got his wRC+ up to 129 by the end of the season, seven points higher than it was the year before, and Bichette led the American League in hits for the second season in a row.

Toronto went 22-11 over that span and was able to clinch the top Wild Card spot in the American League, returning to the playoffs in a full season for the first time since 2016. However, an eventual collapse in the Wild Card round against the Seattle Mariners would lead to some big organizational decisions heading into 2023. 

It was a busy offseason for Ross Atkins and the Blue Jays. It started with Teoscar Hernández and the last year of his contract getting shipped to Seattle for Erik Swanson and eventually saw Daulton Varsho come over in exchange for Gabriel Moreno and Lourdes Gurriel Jr.

It was the start of the Blue Jays emphasizing defense and the details of the game rather than pure offensive upside.

But, a sneaky important part of the offseason was that the Blue Jays bought out Bichette’s arbitration years with a three-year extension.

See, as much as 2019 through 2025 will be remembered as the “Vladdy and Bo era” to Blue Jays fans, so much of it was spent debating which of the two was actually the better player, and if the Jays would be able to keep one or both past their rookie contracts. At the time, this deal looked like a major indication that the Jays might prefer Bichette to Guerrero long-term.

Bichette made good on that new contract early on. In 2023, he continued to do exactly what he had the two previous seasons.

Although it ended as another disappointing season overall for his team, Bo hit .306 with an .814 OPS, putting together his third straight 20-homer season and earning his second All-Star appearance.

Yet, some adversity was right around the corner for Bo and the Blue Jays.

After back-to-back playoff appearances without a win, and a total of three playoff appearances without a win in the Vladdy and Bo era, the fanbase was getting restless for some postseason success. Pressure was on for the Jays heading into 2024.

By now, you know how this story ends, and that the playoff victories were just around the corner, but based on how 2024 went, you can’t blame the people who were calling for the removal of the front office or for a full-scale teardown and rebuild.

There were a lot of sources to blame for that 74-win, last-place season, and Bo Bichette’s inability to stay on the field, and his poor performance when he did play was definitely a big one. That 74-88 record was the worst record for a Blue Jays team since before Bichette's rookie season, and it was by far Bo’s worst season as an individual.

He suited up for just 81 games, hit just .225, and only managed four homers. When it was all said and done, he had put up just 0.3 fWAR and a 70 wRC+, 30% below league average.

The season was a complete write-off for both Bichette and the Jays on the field. When the shortstop responded to a question from a San Francisco reporter about what he liked about the California city and if he’d be willing to play there, Bichette seemed eager to emphasize how much he wanted to play for a winner, and that the Giants would be a fit if he were choosing his team.

Some saw this as him “flirting” with the idea of being traded at the deadline, as he was only under contract for one more season.

I don’t think this episode taints his legacy with the Jays, but at a time when a lot of fans were upset with the direction of the team, and with Bichette himself, it seemed more likely than not that Bichette would play the final year of his contract somewhere other than Toronto.

As we know, Bichette was not traded, and his bounce-back season was essential to the Jays winning their first division title in a decade – and their first pennant in more than three decades.

I could have written this whole article about Bichette’s 2025.

His 134 wRC+ was his best in a qualified season as a Blue Jay. He hit .311 with just a 14.5% strikeout rate, which was the lowest of his career by more than five points. There’s a serious case to be made that 2025 was the best offensive season of Bo’s career, and that’s without even getting into some of his biggest moments.

The Jays were just 26-28 before play on May 28, and the offense was limping through the start of the season. They’d hit the fifth fewest homers in the sport and had just a 94 team wRC+. 

The whole lineup needed a spark, and after being held scoreless through eight innings by Tyler Mahle and the Texas Rangers, it looked like they were en route to falling three games below .500.

That is, until Bichette came off the bench to pinch hit for Michael Stefanic in the top of the ninth inning with two outs and Ernie Clement on second base.

Bo swung and hit a wall-scraping homer over the left field fence, lifting the Jays to a much-needed win, which many claim as the moment the 2025 Blue Jays hit their stride.

The win sparked a five-game win streak and a 12-2 stretch that the Jays never looked back from. From Bichette's clutch homer on May 28 through the end of the season, the Blue Jays had the best offense in baseball by wRC+, fWAR, and, most importantly, runs scored. They’d finish the season on a 67-40 run; that's a .626 winning percentage, or a 101-win pace.

I can’t honestly tell you that the Jays’ magical 2025 season came because of that moment in Texas. But I also can’t tell you that it would have happened without it.

The question in the title of this article is a tough one to answer because, for as beloved as he was in Toronto, Bichette was far from a perfect player. The obvious things to point at are that his shortstop defense always left something to be desired, he wasn’t always a good baserunner, and when he wasn’t hitting, he didn’t bring much else to the table.

Yet, when the Jays needed him, he was always there to answer the call.

FanGraphs’ definition of high-leverage situations is complicated, but I can tell you that throughout his career, in those high-leverage situations, that is when Bo has been at his best. You can argue all you want that clutch isn’t a repeatable skill, but I’ll just keep pointing at Bichette’s career 143 wRC+ and .888 OPS in those situations.

There’s no better example to point to than his performance in the 2025 World Series, which he played in after missing more than a month of games due to a knee injury. On one knee, and on the biggest stage baseball has to offer, Bo Bichette went 8-for-23 with six RBI.

But the lasting memory of Bo Bichette in a Blue Jays uniform will always be him hitting a go-ahead, three-run home run off of Shohei Ohtani in Game 7. A swing that was painfully close to being the swing that clinched the Blue Jays their third World Series championship.

You’ll be seeing fans wearing #11 jerseys at the Rogers Centre for years to come, and when the New York Mets visit Toronto in June this season, the standing ovation Bichette receives will be deafening.

 

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[Mike LeSage]

Bo-utifully written! 

[jaysblue]

I bought a Bo jersey last week for $90. Regular price was $250. What a deal! 

[Owen Hill]

1 hour ago, jaysblue said:

I bought a Bo jersey last week for $90. Regular price was $250. What a deal! 

Underrated part of star players leaving lol