What's the longest postseason drought in Blue Jays franchise history?

As the Toronto Blue Jays' 2024 season mercifully sputters to an end, fans of Canada's team will be without postseason baseball again. Despite making it to October baseball in three of the previous four seasons, Blue Jays fans have only had a tease of the excitement that playoff baseball brings to a city.

The team's recent forays into the MLB playoffs haven't gone well. They've been bounced in two straight games in all three of their recent Wild Card Series appearances — the last two in disastrous fashion.

Getting to the postseason is a challenging task, especially in the AL East. You never know how long it will be before your team is back in the dance. Will 2024's disappointment be an aberration for the Blue Jays, with a resurgence back to contention again next season? Or is this fall the first of many without games in October?

The team has been around since 1977 and has made 10 postseason appearances in its 47 years of existence, but what is the longest stretch the Blue Jays have gone without a postseason berth?

The Blue Jays' longest postseason drought lasted 21 seasons

Like most expansion teams, it took a while for the Blue Jays to gain traction and become contenders — they went eight seasons without playoff baseball after joining the league. The 1985 team, led by George Bell, Jesse Barfield and Dave Stieb, made it to the American League Championship Series but bowed out in seven games to the eventual World Series champion Kansas City Royals.

Those eight years aren't even close to the longest drought the Blue Jays have experienced, however.

The Jays made the postseason four out of five years from 1989 to 1993, culminating in the unforgettable back-to-back World Series championships. Unfortunately, the playoffs became a distant and dusty memory after that. Their third-place finish in the shortened 1994 season kicked off a postseason drought that lasted a mind-boggling 21 years, up until the José Bautista- and Josh Donaldson-led Jays made it back to the playoffs in 2015.

There were some lean times during the 21 years without playoff baseball in Toronto. The Blue Jays played to a 1,634-1,702 record (.490 winning percentage), with their highest finish in the division coming in 2006 when they finished second. They only finished last four times during this span, however.

These non-playoff years saw some legendary Blue Jays put up phenomenal seasons and careers in the blue and white (and sometimes black) only to be denied a chance at postseason glory.

Through the late 1990s and early 2000s, first baseman Carlos Delgado ran amuck in the AL East earning three Silver Sluggers, two All-Star appearances and MVP votes in four separate seasons. Roger Clemens spent 1997 and 1998 in a Blue Jays uniform and took home the Cy Young Award both years, but never appeared in the postseason.

You can also include the likes of Vernon Wells on this list, but perhaps no player is more emblematic of the Blue Jays' two-decade-long stretch of postseason futility than the late Roy Halladay. The ace arrived in Toronto in 1998 but didn't really arrive until 2002, when he began an eight-year stretch of absolute domination.

Halladay went 130-59 with an MLB-best 44 fWAR and 46 complete games over that span. He earned six All-Star appearances and a Cy Young but didn't see the mound once in the playoffs, with the J.P. Ricciardi-constructed Jays playing to an uninspiring 642-653 record. Ultimately, Halladay had to leave for the Philadelphia Phillies after the 2009 season to get a taste of the postseason. At least he made the most of it despite never winning a World Series.

Every Blue Jays fan will agree that 21 years was too long to wait for playoff baseball to return to Toronto, so let's hope that it's not another two decades before we see October baseball back at Rogers Centre.