Remembering Jim Clancy: 1955 - 2025

Jim Clancy was with the Jays from their first season in 1977 until his last game in October 1988 (when he got the win over Baltimore). He was one of the earliest ‘all-time Jays’ and remains among the franchise leaders in several categories. Today, we look back and remember the impact Clancy had on those early years and the legacy he has left behind today.

Clancy was drafted in the 4th round of the 1974 MLB Draft by the Texas Rangers. He was drafted from St. Rita of Cascia High School in Chicago, where he was also the quarterback of the school football team. He ultimately chose the baseball route and was inducted into the St. Rita Hall of Fame in 1985. Following the draft, he began working his way through the Texas minor league system. 

In the 1976 expansion draft, established teams could protect 15 players from their 40-man roster, and an additional three players after each of the first two rounds. In the third round, though they may not have known it at the time, the Jays found their ace in Clancy. He was called up at the end of July in the Jays' first season to join the major league club and get his debut start against the team that drafted him, Texas. It was a rough start, giving up five hits and five runs and getting the hook after two innings. His next start was a different story. Clancy got his first win in a complete game, giving up only one earned run. He would go on to throw 72 more complete games over his career with the Jays and is second all-time with the franchise. Number one on that list is long-time Clancy teammate Dave Stieb. Stieb and Clancy were absolute workhorses for the Jays in the early days and were even roommates for a short time in the late 70s when Stieb first joined the team.

While Stieb would go on to eclipse a lot of Clancy’s marks, it was Clancy who hit the milestones first. He was the first to 1000 innings pitched and 100 wins. Only five Jays pitchers in the team’s history have hit that total for wins, and only eight have thrown that many innings. Clancy would throw another 1200+ innings and is again, second all-time with his 2204 2/3 innings pitched.

He led the team in bWAR in 1980 and was the team’s sole representative at the 1982 All-Star Game. In that 1982 season, Clancy led the entire league with 40 starts - a franchise record and a feat that hasn’t been surpassed in the league since. Incredibly, the following closest all-time marks (38 starts) belong to batterymates Stieb and Luis Leal from that same 1982 season. Then it’s Clancy again with sole ownership of the 4th spot (37 starts in 1987) and a shared hold of the 5th (36 starts in 1984). Even in a different era, when the workhorse pitcher was more common, Clancy stood out, and the Jays benefited from his reliability.

Arguably, Clancy’s most memorable game with Toronto came at the end of September in his All-Star season. Pitching in the first game of a double-header against Minnesota, Clancy sat down every batter he faced through 8 innings - 24 of 24. Entering the 9th inning, a perfect game within reach, Clancy had it broken up by a bloop Randy Bush single into no-man's land between the second baseman and right fielder. Clancy’s catcher that day, Buck Martinez, said the broken-bat single was the Twins' only chance to spoil the perfect game because “the way he was throwing there was no way they were going to get a hit off him.” Clancy ended up getting the win in a complete game, one-hit shutout. He faced one more batter than the minimum in that game, a franchise record, which has been equalled twice, but it’s another case where Clancy was the first.

On October 1, 1988, Clancy would take the mound for Toronto one last time. His catcher that day was Ernie Whitt, another player the Jays acquired in the 1976 Expansion Draft and the only player remaining with the team as long as Clancy. After five innings, Clancy was in line for the win and picked up his 128th with the franchise - only Stieb and Roy Halladay would go on to get more.

Jim Clancy isn’t always the first Blue Jays name mentioned in a conversation about the history of the team, but the more time you spend looking through the franchise's statistics and record books, the more often his name pops up. In March 2017, former Blue Jays president Paul Beeston, remarking on Clancy and his durability, said, “He would take the ball and pitch until his arm fell off,” in a Sportsnet article in appreciation of Clancy. Manny Randhawa of MLB.com tipped Clancy as the best pick of the 1976 draft, and in 2020, Keegan Matheson ranked Clancy as his #3 all-time right-hander for the Jays. A mainstay of those early Jays teams, and no matter how you look at it, gone too soon.