The Rogers Centre Is Finally Getting a Proper Statue

On February 2, the Toronto Blue Jays announced a major change coming to the exterior of the Rogers Centre. Arguably more important and a longer time coming than any of the recent interior renovations. We're getting a statue! Not just any statue, but one of Joe Carter, commemorating the back-to-back championships of the ‘92 and ‘93 teams. 

Carter said, via social media: “My teammates from ‘92 and ‘93 are a special group, and we all understood what it meant to play for an entire country. We felt such pride wearing the maple leaf on our uniforms. Fans embraced us, and we loved them right back. This statue is for the fans.”

Of course, this isn't the first statue to grace the public space outside of Gates 5 and 6, it's just the first one of a Jays player. In 2013, a bronze statue of Edward “Ted” Rogers was installed. I think it's fair to say that the Rogers statue was met with mixed reviews. A statue like that doesn't appear overnight, so a board of directors and the Rogers family themselves were mostly in favour, I'm sure. On the other hand, in over a decade of its existence, I've never met or overheard a fan that thought it was a good idea. 

I'm not a total grump though. I can give some credit where it's due. Rogers purchased a majority share of the Jays in September 2000 at a time when the future of the only MLB team north of the border was much less stable than it is today. There's an alternate reality where Rogers doesn't buy the team and someone else moves it south. There's also an actual reality where I don't want to see a 12-foot-tall monument to the guy that represents a monopoly on the excessively-priced cell phone/cable/internet bills we're limited to. The Rogers statue will be moved to a more appropriate location – Rogers corporate headquarters – where I’m sure it will be met with the appropriate amount of celebration.

Details are light at this point, which opens the door to rampant speculation. The main question is: What will Joe Carter's look like? The lasting image of Carter’s home run is him in mid-air, leaping up the first base line. Floating statues are tricky, but not impossible; the best sports-related one I can think of is the Bobby Orr statue in Boston. This has to be option number one. A less whimsical statue would probably take either Carter’s batting stance ahead of the pitch or an in-motion swing. The majority of the statues at other major league parks (the Jays are one of the last to install a player statue) commemorating a hitter depict them within the batter’s box. Uninspired, but probably option number two. My dark horse pitch for the statue is the image of Carter up on the shoulders of his teammates, with both arms extended in the air, being carried towards the dugout. Call that option three. We don’t have to limit ourselves to just thinking about the visual element – what about an audio component? This is where I make my official declaration to ask for a push-button installed in the base that just plays the relevant line from Choclair’s "Let’s Ride". We can honour two Toronto icons in one statue!

It took until the 50th anniversary of the franchise to get the first commemorative statue, but now that the dam has been breached, who might we see next? My mind is already giddy at the idea of putting a José Bautista statue at the base of the CN Tower with a bat that ‘flips’ its way up and down the tower with the elevators, but despite that moment happening a decade ago, it still feels slightly too recent for the statue treatment. Realistically, the next statue probably comes down to one of two guys. Depending on your era (not to be confused with your ERA), you probably have a favourite Blue Jays workhorse. I’ll hear the cases for both Roy Halladay and Dave Stieb and would be thrilled with either one of them being immortalized next. If I were betting, I’d give Stieb a slight edge, but whichever is next, I’d follow it up with the other as the third statue before looking at another batter. My dark horse for this section is Buck Martinez. I think it’s more likely we see his name on the Level of Excellence next, but a statue of Buck turning a double play with a broken leg? That would look real nice on the concourse somewhere.

With the Blue Jays celebrating their 50th year, I hope to hear more announcements like this one. What the statue will look like and what else we might get remain to be seen, but one thing I’m certain of? No one is going to threaten to throw Joe Carter into the lake.