Toronto Blue Jays: 5 takeaways from Paul Molitor interview
By Paul Taylor
We break down the interview between Sportsnet’s Dan Shulman and Paul Molitor, who only spent three seasons with the Toronto Blue Jays but still left an indelible mark.
Paul Molitor spent the majority of his Major League career in Wisconsin, and understandably entered the Baseball Hall of Fame as a Milwaukee Brewer (on his first ballot no less). However, it was with the Toronto Blue Jays that he finally won his elusive World Series championship.
Molitor’s time with the Blue Jays was short but memorable. During his three years in Toronto, he was a two-time All-Star, won a Silver Slugger award and named MVP of the 1993 World Series.
On Friday, the 63-year-old spoke with Sportsnet‘s Dan Shulman. We count down our five takeaways from Shulman’s interview with Molitor:
5) Molitor wanted to stay in Milwaukee
Even before arriving in Toronto, Molitor had already enjoyed an excellent career in the Majors. During his time with the Brewers, he was a five-time All-Star, won two Silver Slugger awards and enjoyed a 39-game hitting streak, which is the seventh-longest in baseball history.
The Saint Paul, Minnesota native had helped the Brewers advance to the World Series in 1982, where the team lost after an enthralling seven-game series against the St. Louis Cardinals. As far as he was concerned, he was going to finish his career in Milwaukee and hopefully help them win a championship.
Following the conclusion of the 1992 season however, it soon became clear Molitor was not going to get that opportunity to play his entire Major League career with just one team. Set to become a free agent, the team apparently wanted him to take a pay cut.
Contrast that with the Blue Jays’ three-year, US $13 million guaranteed offer and the chance to win that elusive championship, and no one could begrudge Molitor for making the move to Canada. As per Sportsnet, he said:
"“I just started to look for a good match and believe me, when you have two people like Paul Beeston and Pat Gillick knocking on your door, it makes quite an impression and over the course of our discussion it became clear to me Toronto was going to be a really good fit. Not only because I enjoyed those two people and their vision of what was going to happen, but obviously I was aware of them coming off a championship.”"