Last Updated on: 4th March 2021, 07:52 am
I’m not sure where this tape came from, but Toronto Mike has dug up and posted audio from October 5th, 1985. That’s the day that the Toronto Blue Jays clinched their first ever AL East division title with a 5-1 win over the New York Yankees.
This is the radio call of the bottom of the 9th inning, a quick rundown of the game totals and then several minutes worth of interviews conducted by Tom Cheek, who I still miss to this day.
I was a little too young to fully appreciate this or even to remember it all that well now, but it was a pretty huge deal. A big enough deal that among the postgame clubhouse interviews are both then mayor of Toronto Art Eggleton and Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, the latter calling in to congratulate Jays manager Bobby Cox just minutes after the game ended.
For those who care about this sort of thing, the radio station referenced as The Music of Your Life at the start of the recording is 1430 CJCL, which would later become The Fan 1430 and which we now know as Sportsnet 590 The Fan. The station originally went by the call letters CKFH, the FH standing for Foster Hewitt, the legendary hockey announcer who owned it.
Oh, and who is the clown who tried to steal George Bell’s hat? Come on, man.