I went to a Jays-Tampa Bay game last week at Rogers Centre and, while I was expecting to see a lot of empty seats, I wasn't prepared for my family and I to basically have a row by myself.
When it comes to baseball, Jays fans are a fickle bunch and, the way this team is playing, my guess is that the crowds will continue to dwindle, save for when the Red Sox or Yankees are in town.
The Jays used to have the luxury if being pretty well the only big-league summer sports attraction in town. But, with Toronto FC mania in its second season, the Jays, if they continue to play not only bad baseball, but boring baseball, will find that they will slide further back in relevance than they've ever been before.
It's hard to love this Jays team. Not because it's not very good (at the start of the season, I picked the Jays to finish fourth in the East. I might have been optimistic), but because there are no real characters on this club. It's hard to love a team that wears ridiculous black jerseys, basing their look on a black-jersey fad that died out a decade ago. It's hard to love a team that replaced BJ Birdie with a more sleek, less loveable mascot. Yes BJ, I got your back.
For an older Jays fan — as in over 30 — this team gives me precious little to make me think that this is the same franchise I used to live and die with in the '80s and early '90s. We have fabricated rivalries with the Yankees and Red Sox, not like the real we-hate-them-as-much-as-they-hate-us series we used to have with the Tigers. Remember, back in the heyday of the Jays, you would be willing to sell an entire series of Sox or Yankees tickets just to see the Tigers once.
We have a sterile team that acts almost embarrassed about its World Series-winning history, playing in a sterile environment. Meanwhile, just down Lake Shore Boulevard, we have another summer major pro team that's offering the best environment for any sports fan in the city. And, as of this moment, there's no question that TFC is offering far more on-field entertainment than the Blue Jays, too.
Sooner or later, the Rogers people are going to need to not only radically remake its ball team, but really work to reconnect with fans, especially the ones who remember Jesse Barfield's arm in right, the old Errrr-neeee, Errrrr-neeee chants and shaking every time Joey McLaughlin came onto the mound.

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