A rundown of the Blue Jays ten previous playoff runs

2025 will mark the 11th time in the Toronto Blue Jays 48 year history that they will be playing playoff baseball after clinching a playoff berth on Sunday. However, as you’ll see with this list, the Blue Jays have never won three series in a single playoff round, let alone four if they somehow slip to a wild card spot in the season's final week. 

While there have been two World Series championship titles among their previous ten appearances, there has also been much heartbreak and frustration with the Blue Jays’ October runs.

1985: Blue Jays lose ALCS to Kansas City Royals 4-3

Back when you could only get to the playoffs if you won your respective division, the Blue Jays, who came into existence nine seasons earlier, had finally broken through and claimed the top spot in the AL East finishing 99-62, still the franchise record for wins in a season. 

The Blue Jays took on the Royals (91-71) and built up a 3-1 lead. Had this been 1984 the Blue Jays would have been going to the World Series. But prior to the start of the ‘85 season, MLB decided to shift the League Championship Series to a best of seven format. The Blue Jays lost both Game Five and Game Six by just two runs in each contest, before falling in Game Seven 6-2. 

1989: Blue Jays lose ALCS to Oakland Athletics 4-1

Four years later, the Blue Jays were back in the postseason thanks in part to a mid-season coaching change where Jimmy Williams (12-24) was shown the door and Cito Gaston (77-49) took over the reins. Gaston guided the Blue Jays to an 89-73 record. 

However, they were no match for the 99-63 Oakland A’s whose leadoff man, Rickey Henderson, was an absolute beast in this series. Henderson led the team in almost every offensive category slashing .400/.609/.1000 with eight stolen bases, seven walks, no strikeouts and tied for the team lead with two home runs - the same amount as Mark McGwire and Jose Canseco combined. The Blue Jays dropped Games One and Two, took Game Three at home, before falling in the next two contests by a single run 6-5 and 4-3. 

1991: Blue Jays lose ALCS to Minnesota Twins (4-1)

As heartbreaking as 1985 was, and as underwhelming as 1989 was, 1991 really feels like the most forgettable of all of those series. Most of the faces that turned them from upstarts to contenders in the 80’s were gone, replaced by the likes of Joe Carter, Roberto Alomar, John Olerud and Devon White. The team was good, going 91-71 and winning the division handedly by seven games over the defending AL East champion Boston Red Sox. 

But they ran into a wall against the Twins (95-67). They split the first two games in Minnesota, before the Twins won 3-2 in ten innings at Skydome in Game Three and the rest of the series wasn’t really close with the Twins closing it out with 9-3 and 8-5 victories over the final two games.

1992: Blue Jays win World Series over Atlanta Braves (4-2). Blue Jays win ALCS over Oakland Athletics (4-2). 

That offseason GM Pat Gillick landed big name free agents Dave Winfield and Jack Morris and the rest, as they say, is history. Toronto (96-66) met their playoff nemesis in the Athletics (96-66) and one of the most iconic moments in franchise history came to fruition when the Blue Jays came from behind in Game Four in Oakland to score three runs in the eighth and Alomar hit a game-tying home run in the top of the ninth off future Hall of Famer Dennis Eckersley.

The Blue Jays won that game in the 11th inning to take a 3-1 series lead over Oakland, and clinched their first AL pennant three days later with a 9-2 win at home in Game Six. 

Ten days later they were World Series champions. This series against the Braves had a little bit of everything. Great pitching, spectacular defense and timely hits. The Blue Jays won three straight games by a single run, while winning two of those games by knocking in a run in their final at-bat. In Game Six in Atlanta, with a 3-2 series lead, Winfield drove in the winning runs and Mike Timlin came out of the bullpen to save the game, and send the World Series banner north of the border. 

1993: Blue Jays win World Series over Philadelphia Phillies (4-2). Blue Jays win ALCS over Chicago White Sox (4-2)  

It hadn’t been done since the 1977-78 New York Yankees, but the ‘93 Blue Jays became the first team in the “free agency” era to build a team that won back-to-back World Series championships. The road to get there went through Chicago (94-68) who had both the AL Cy Young Award winner (Jack McDowell) and the AL MVP (Frank Thomas) on their squad.

Toronto (95-67) took the first two games on the road. They dropped the next two at home, but came through in Game Five when Juan Guzmán outdueled McDowell and the Blue Jays won 5-3 for a 3-2 series lead. They clinched in Game Six with a 6-3 win in Chicago on October 12. 11 days later - Carter touched ‘em all.

While that will always be the number one memory from this series, the Blue Jays and Phillies had quite the battle over six games. Outside of Philadelphia’s 2-0 win in Game Five, the winning team scored at least six runs in every contest in a series that was defined by hitting. 

2015: Blue Jays lose ALCS to Kansas City Royals (4-2). Blue Jays win ALDS over Texas Rangers (3-2). 

22 years after Carter’s home run, Jose Bautista gave us the ‘bat flip heard ‘round the world.’ In their first trip to the postseason in two decades, Toronto (93-69) were division champions once again and met a Rangers (88-74) team that had very recently lost back-to-back World Series.

The Blue Jays lost the first two games, before taking the next two on the road. In Game five, the seventh inning became one of the craziest innings of baseball ever played and it was all capped off by Bautista’s three-run home run to put the Jays ahead for good. 

Bautista almost had another moment of that kind of magnitude in the next series against the Royals (95-67). With the Blue Jays down 3-2 in the series, Bautista hit a solo home run in the fourth and then a game-tying two-run home run in the eighth inning, but the Blue Jays gave up a run in the bottom half, trailing 4-3 going into the ninth. The Blue Jays then got runners on the corners with nobody out, but back-to-back strikeouts and a groundout later and the 2015 season was all of a sudden over.

2016: Blue Jays lose ALCS to Cleveland Guardians (4-1). Blue Jays win ALDS over Texas Rangers (3-0). Blue Jays win AL Wild Card Game over Baltimore Orioles 5-2. 

This was in the era where the Wild Card teams were forced to play in a one-game playoff. The Blue Jays and their division rivals the Orioles finished with identical 89-73 records, but Toronto got to host the game that went into the 11th inning with the game tied 2-2.

With runners on first and third and one out, Orioles manager Buck Showalter committed one of the worst managerial errors in postseason history and left a struggling Ubaldo Jiménez in the game to face Edwin Encarnación who had hit 42 home runs in the regular season. Edwin went deep with a walk-off three-run home run and the Blue Jays punched their ticket to the ALDS for a rematch against the Rangers. 

The Rangers got humiliated by the Blue Jays as Toronto won 10-1 in Game One, 5-3 in Game Two and then Toronto walked them off to end the series in Game Three on a play known as the “Donaldson Dash” when Josh Donaldson rounded third on a fielder's choice error in the bottom of the tenth and sprinted home for the series winning run.

Toronto’s offense then disappeared completely against the Guardians in the ALCS. The Guardians took a commanding 3-0 series lead over the Blue Jays by winning 2-0, 2-1, and 4-2. Toronto took Game Four 5-1 to stave off elimination, but fell 3-0 in Game Five. 

2020: Blue Jays lose AL Wild Card series to Tampa Bay Rays (2-0)

During the Covid-shortened season, the Blue Jays (32-28) qualified for an expanded postseason that included eight teams from each league. While they bowed out in two games to the Rays (3-1, 8-2) it was a sign of things to come as it was the first taste of playoff baseball during the Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Bo Bichette era. 

2022: Blue Jays lose AL Wild Card series to Seattle Mariners (2-0)

The Blue Jays finished in a tie for the third best record in the American League (92-70) and had a ton of momentum heading into the postseason. But in a series they got to host at Rogers Centre, the bats were stifled by Luis Castillo in Game One losing 4-0. Game Two turned into a horror show as it became one of the worst collapses in a do-or-die game in playoff history as Toronto squandered an 8-1 lead, and were still up 9-5 going into the top of the eighth before the Mariners stormed back and won 10-9 to end Toronto’s season. 

2023: Blue Jays lose AL Wild Card series to Minnesota Twins (2-0)

The Blue Jays regressed in 2023 and basically stumbled their way into the playoffs finishing third in the division with an 89-73 record and grabbing the last playoff spot available. A lot of fans felt they barely deserved to be a playoff team that year, but they had a chance to prove everyone wrong if they could string together some success in October. 

Not only did that success not materialize but the Blue Jays were embarrassed by the Twins, a team that had a worse record than them at 87-75. The Twins scored five runs over the two games and still swept the Jays. In Game One it was a 3-1 victory and in Game Two it was a 2-0 shutout. What stands out about this series is the baffling decision to remove Blue Jays pitcher José Berrios in the bottom of the fourth while he was having a strong game. There’s also the pickoff of Guerrero Jr. at second base to end the top of the fifth with runners on second and third and Bo Bichette at the plate. 

The Blue Jays now in 2025 will be looking for their first playoff win since Game Four of the 2016 ALCS.