After Game 5's win, I was feeling confident that the Toronto Blue Jays would win the World Series. History placed us at roughly a 75% probability of success. Polymarket had even flipped in favor of the Jays for the first time. We were up 3–2 in the series and heading home.
But of course that didn't happen on Saturday. Toronto lost.
We Torontonians will always remember the 2025 Blue Jays and how fun of a season it was, but history doesn't care about second place. What history will remember is that the Los Angeles Dodgers went back-to-back and strengthened their baseball dynasty. This is to be expected.
But here's the thing, if you watched the series, you'll know that it could have gone either way. We lost in Game 7 in extra innings, after looking like the better team throughout most of the series.
What if Isiah Kiner-Falefa had taken a slightly bigger lead at third? What if that ball had never gotten improbably wedged under the outfield padding? What if Andy Pages had collided with Kiké Hernandez and not made the catch? The list goes on.
My point is not to be a sore loser — congratulations to Los Angeles — my point is that a few millimeters are all it takes to separate sadness from celebration. (Inches also work, but I prefer to use the international standard for weights and measures.)
It's a good lesson for life and business. Small, consistent changes can be all that it takes, especially because over time they compound.
It reminds me of something that chef Daniel Hadida says in this video when talking about Restaurant Pearl Morissette (in the Niagara Benchlands). He says, "I'm willing to go significantly harder to achieve slightly better." And that's because slightly is all it takes.
This past Monday, approximately 44,770 attendees descended on the SkyDome, I mean Rogers Centre, in downtown Toronto to watch Game 7 of the ALCS between the Blue Jays and the Mariners. I was lucky enough to be one of them. And with one swing of George Springer's bat, we did it.
The Blue Jays became only the fourth team in the history of Major League Baseball to come back and win a best-of-seven series after losing the first two games at home. (Baseball is full of fun little stats.)
This is what makes October baseball so exciting. It's slow and suspenseful, but then all of a sudden — boom — you completely lose your voice because you're screaming so hard. I still don't have mine back at the time of writing this post.
What a game. What a moment for Toronto.
Now let's switch gears and think about all of this from an urban mobility standpoint. Forty-five thousand is a lot of people. How do you efficiently move this many people to and from a stadium? One option is you could build a ton of parking.
Here, for example, is Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles:
But this is a suboptimal approach, which is why a year ago the LA Times had to write: "Going to Dodger Stadium for the World Series? Five ways to avoid parking and traffic headaches." In it, they suggest the following: Take the bus, take the Dodger Stadium Express Bus, take an Uber, ride your bike, or walk 30 minutes to the nearest metro station (Chinatown).
On Monday, we took the Union Pearson Express from Bloor to Union. The train was absolutely packed, but we got on the first one and we were door-to-door in a little over 30 minutes. After the game, it was pandemonium. People were swinging from light poles, lighting off smoke bombs, and the lineup to get back on the UP Express looked like this:
But here's where I need to give a lot of credit to whoever was responsible for keeping things together on Monday night. They had stanchions lined up to accommodate the crowds flooding out of the Rogers Centre, they had staff walking up and down the lines so people could tap on ahead of time, and they had more trains operating. The result was that we waited maybe 10 or so minutes before getting on one.
Nobody got out of downtown this quickly unless you were on a train or you biked. My friends who had to take Ubers home were stuck for hours. In fact, one driver said, "We're not moving for a while. You're better off going into that bar right now and I'll come back for you later."
Sometimes when I write about trains and public transport, people comment that I'm living in the past and that it's an outdated technology. Look, I'm all for new tech. Bring on the autonomous vehicles and let's get the global financial system onto the Ethereum blockchain already. But when it comes to urban mobility, trains work. They're highly efficient at moving the greatest number of people.
And you really see that in action when there are sudden demand shocks, like what happened on Monday night when the Blue Jays punched their card to the World Series for the first time since 1993. Go Jays!
After Game 5's win, I was feeling confident that the Toronto Blue Jays would win the World Series. History placed us at roughly a 75% probability of success. Polymarket had even flipped in favor of the Jays for the first time. We were up 3–2 in the series and heading home.
But of course that didn't happen on Saturday. Toronto lost.
We Torontonians will always remember the 2025 Blue Jays and how fun of a season it was, but history doesn't care about second place. What history will remember is that the Los Angeles Dodgers went back-to-back and strengthened their baseball dynasty. This is to be expected.
But here's the thing, if you watched the series, you'll know that it could have gone either way. We lost in Game 7 in extra innings, after looking like the better team throughout most of the series.
What if Isiah Kiner-Falefa had taken a slightly bigger lead at third? What if that ball had never gotten improbably wedged under the outfield padding? What if Andy Pages had collided with Kiké Hernandez and not made the catch? The list goes on.
My point is not to be a sore loser — congratulations to Los Angeles — my point is that a few millimeters are all it takes to separate sadness from celebration. (Inches also work, but I prefer to use the international standard for weights and measures.)
It's a good lesson for life and business. Small, consistent changes can be all that it takes, especially because over time they compound.
It reminds me of something that chef Daniel Hadida says in this video when talking about Restaurant Pearl Morissette (in the Niagara Benchlands). He says, "I'm willing to go significantly harder to achieve slightly better." And that's because slightly is all it takes.
This past Monday, approximately 44,770 attendees descended on the SkyDome, I mean Rogers Centre, in downtown Toronto to watch Game 7 of the ALCS between the Blue Jays and the Mariners. I was lucky enough to be one of them. And with one swing of George Springer's bat, we did it.
The Blue Jays became only the fourth team in the history of Major League Baseball to come back and win a best-of-seven series after losing the first two games at home. (Baseball is full of fun little stats.)
This is what makes October baseball so exciting. It's slow and suspenseful, but then all of a sudden — boom — you completely lose your voice because you're screaming so hard. I still don't have mine back at the time of writing this post.
What a game. What a moment for Toronto.
Now let's switch gears and think about all of this from an urban mobility standpoint. Forty-five thousand is a lot of people. How do you efficiently move this many people to and from a stadium? One option is you could build a ton of parking.
Here, for example, is Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles:
But this is a suboptimal approach, which is why a year ago the LA Times had to write: "Going to Dodger Stadium for the World Series? Five ways to avoid parking and traffic headaches." In it, they suggest the following: Take the bus, take the Dodger Stadium Express Bus, take an Uber, ride your bike, or walk 30 minutes to the nearest metro station (Chinatown).
On Monday, we took the Union Pearson Express from Bloor to Union. The train was absolutely packed, but we got on the first one and we were door-to-door in a little over 30 minutes. After the game, it was pandemonium. People were swinging from light poles, lighting off smoke bombs, and the lineup to get back on the UP Express looked like this:
But here's where I need to give a lot of credit to whoever was responsible for keeping things together on Monday night. They had stanchions lined up to accommodate the crowds flooding out of the Rogers Centre, they had staff walking up and down the lines so people could tap on ahead of time, and they had more trains operating. The result was that we waited maybe 10 or so minutes before getting on one.
Nobody got out of downtown this quickly unless you were on a train or you biked. My friends who had to take Ubers home were stuck for hours. In fact, one driver said, "We're not moving for a while. You're better off going into that bar right now and I'll come back for you later."
Sometimes when I write about trains and public transport, people comment that I'm living in the past and that it's an outdated technology. Look, I'm all for new tech. Bring on the autonomous vehicles and let's get the global financial system onto the Ethereum blockchain already. But when it comes to urban mobility, trains work. They're highly efficient at moving the greatest number of people.
And you really see that in action when there are sudden demand shocks, like what happened on Monday night when the Blue Jays punched their card to the World Series for the first time since 1993. Go Jays!
You can have one of the best records in the league or you can be slumping right before the post-season, and none of that matters when the month of October hits. Such is baseball. And such is life.
What does help, though, is being bold. The Blue Jays got lucky on Sunday night with Odor’s throwing error. But Donaldson was also willing to take a chance and make a run for home plate. It paid off in a big way. His instincts were right.
I found the above image on social media without a source. If I’m pissing anyone off by posting it here, let me know and I’ll take it down. I just love how it captures the exact moment – with the ball still in the air – when Donaldson proclaims victory.
Baseball will always be a special sport for me. I have never been a big hockey fan and the Raptors didn’t exist until the mid-90s. So as a kid growing up in Toronto, I played baseball and watched the Jays.
So here’s to more October baseball. The playoffs are always such a fun time in the city. It has a way of cutting through our differences and uniting us all around a common dream. That doesn’t always happen.
You can have one of the best records in the league or you can be slumping right before the post-season, and none of that matters when the month of October hits. Such is baseball. And such is life.
What does help, though, is being bold. The Blue Jays got lucky on Sunday night with Odor’s throwing error. But Donaldson was also willing to take a chance and make a run for home plate. It paid off in a big way. His instincts were right.
I found the above image on social media without a source. If I’m pissing anyone off by posting it here, let me know and I’ll take it down. I just love how it captures the exact moment – with the ball still in the air – when Donaldson proclaims victory.
Baseball will always be a special sport for me. I have never been a big hockey fan and the Raptors didn’t exist until the mid-90s. So as a kid growing up in Toronto, I played baseball and watched the Jays.
So here’s to more October baseball. The playoffs are always such a fun time in the city. It has a way of cutting through our differences and uniting us all around a common dream. That doesn’t always happen.
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