Baseball in Canada: From the Early Game to the Expos and Blue Jays

By 4Baseball Staff · November 5, 2026 · 9 min read

A history of baseball in Canada, from the reported Beachville game of 1838 and Jackie Robinson in Montreal to the Expos, the Blue Jays' two titles and the Canadian-born players in the historical record.

Baseball in Canada is older than the major leagues. A letter published in 1886 described a game played in Beachville, Ontario, in 1838, and Canadian historians treat it as one of the earliest well-documented ball games in North America. Over the next century and a half the sport spread through southern Ontario, Quebec and the west, produced a Hall of Fame pitcher and a Hall of Fame hitter born in the country, and gave Canadians two major-league clubs: the Montreal Expos, from 1969 to 2004, and the Toronto Blue Jays, from 1977 to the present.

The Blue Jays are the more famous story because of their back-to-back World Series titles in 1992 and 1993, the first for any club outside the United States. The Expos' story is the sadder one, with the best record in the National League when the 1994 season ended in a strike and a move to Washington after 2004. Both are told here with the figures in the historical record through 2025.

This article follows the game from its early days to the present, and it also says what the database can and cannot tell you about the Canadian side of baseball.

The early game: Beachville, 1838

The best-known claim for early Canadian baseball is the Beachville game. In 1886, Dr. Adam Ford wrote a letter to a sporting newspaper describing a ball game played in Beachville, Ontario, on June 4, 1838, when he was a boy. His description includes a bat, a ball, bases and a form of running that resembles the modern game, though with differences in the number of players and the way runners were retired. The letter was written about 48 years after the event, and historians disagree about how much weight to give it. What is not in dispute is that games with bats and balls were played across Ontario and Quebec in the middle of the 19th century and that organized clubs formed in the following decades.

Other claims for early baseball exist in the United States, and the argument over who played first is a long one. For a reader of this blog the safer statement is that Canada has a credible and well-documented early baseball tradition, and that it was part of the same development of the game that produced the rules used in the United States.

Minor leagues, Montreal and Jackie Robinson

For much of the 20th century, Canadian cities hosted clubs in the International League, which is now one of the two Triple-A leagues (see our article on the Pacific Coast and International Leagues). The Toronto Maple Leafs and the Montreal Royals were members for many seasons.

The Royals made the most important single contribution to baseball history from Canadian soil. In 1946 Jackie Robinson, signed by the Brooklyn Dodgers organization, played for the Royals, who were the Dodgers' top farm club, and he played the whole season in Montreal. He moved to Brooklyn the next spring, and his major-league debut in 1947 ended the color line in the major leagues. Montreal's fans are remembered for their warm reception of him, and the city's role is part of the standard account of that season.

Canadians in the major leagues

The historical record lists 248 players born in Canada who have a batting or pitching record in the American or National League through 2025. Of those, 122 were born in Ontario, 40 in British Columbia and 33 in Quebec. The lists of leaders are short, and each is dominated by a few names.

Fergie Jenkins, born in Chatham, Ontario, won 284 games with a 3.34 ERA and 3,192 strikeouts, and he won the Cy Young Award in 1971. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1991 on his third ballot, with 334 votes, one more than the number needed. He won 20 games in six consecutive seasons from 1967 to 1972 for the Chicago Cubs, a streak recorded in the historical year-by-year data.

Larry Walker, from Maple Ridge, British Columbia, hit .313 with 383 home runs and a .400 on-base percentage and a .565 slugging percentage over 17 seasons. He began with the Expos, where he played from 1989 to 1994, and won the 1997 National League MVP award with the Colorado Rockies. That year he hit .366 with 49 home runs and 130 RBI. He won seven Gold Gloves. His Hall of Fame election came in 2020, in his last year on the ballot, with 304 votes of 397 ballots cast.

Justin Morneau, from New Westminster, British Columbia, won the American League MVP award in 2006 for the Minnesota Twins and hit 247 career home runs. Joey Votto, born in Toronto, won the National League MVP in 2010 with the Cincinnati Reds and finished with 356 home runs and a .409 on-base percentage. Each is a part of the story of how a country with a short baseball season and a small number of professional clubs has produced major-league stars.

The Expos, 1969 to 2004

The Montreal Expos entered the National League in 1969 as part of the expansion that also added the San Diego Padres. They were the first major-league club outside the United States. In their first season they went 52-110. Their first home was Jarry Park, a small ballpark in the north end of the city, where their best season attendance was 1,424,683. When the city built a stadium for the 1976 Olympic Games, the Expos moved into it in 1977 and played there until the club left, with a best attendance of 2,320,651 in the historical record, which lists the park as the club's home through 2002 and as shared with a Puerto Rico ballpark in 2003 and 2004.

The Expos' best seasons are all in the historical record. They went 95-65 in 1979 and finished second. In 1981, the strike-split season, they won the National League East's second-half title, the only division title in the franchise's Montreal years, and reached the National League Championship Series, where the Dodgers beat them in five games, a series remembered for a ninth-inning home run by Rick Monday in the deciding game.

The most famous Expos team is the 1994 team. It had a record of 74-40, the best in the National League, when the players' strike ended the season in August and canceled the playoffs and the World Series. Felipe Alou was the manager, and the team included Walker, Marquis Grissom and Pedro Martinez. The club could not keep its stars: the historical record shows Walker with the Rockies by 1995. Alou managed the club from 1992 to 2001, with a record of 691-717. The 1981 season remained the franchise's only trip to the postseason while it was in Montreal.

The franchise's career leaders show how much talent passed through Montreal. Steve Rogers won 158 games and pitched 37 shutouts, Tim Raines stole 635 bases, and the home run list reads Andre Dawson 225, Gary Carter 220 and Vladimir Guerrero 234, with Guerrero's .323 the best average for any Expo with 3,000 at-bats. Pedro Martinez won the Cy Young Award in 1997 with Montreal. Carter, Dawson and Raines were elected to the Hall of Fame with plaques that show Expos caps.

The end came slowly. Attendance fell, the stadium aged, and in 2003 and 2004 the club played part of its home schedule in Puerto Rico. After the 2004 season it moved to Washington and became the Nationals, who won the World Series in 2019. The historical franchise record lists both names as a single franchise, with 4,331 wins and 4,665 losses through 2025.

The Blue Jays, 1977 to the present

The Toronto Blue Jays began as an American League expansion club in 1977, and their first home was Exhibition Stadium, a stadium shared with football, where the season opener was played in cold, snowy weather. They lost 107 games in 1977 and finished with a 54-107 record, then had 109 losses in 1979. Their best attendance at Exhibition Stadium was 2,778,429.

The club improved through the 1980s. It won its first division title in 1985, with 99 wins, and lost the American League Championship Series to the Kansas City Royals after leading three games to one. Further division titles came in 1989 and 1991, and in 1989 the club moved into SkyDome, a stadium with a retractable roof.

The titles came in 1992 and 1993. In 1992 Toronto went 96-66 and beat the Atlanta Braves in the World Series, four games to two, the first title for a club outside the United States. In 1993 the team won 95 games and beat the Philadelphia Phillies in six games on a home run by Joe Carter in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game 6. Cito Gaston managed both clubs, and his 893 wins with Toronto are the most in franchise history.

After that the Jays went 21 seasons without a division title. They returned to the postseason in 2015 with a team built around Jose Bautista (288 home runs for the club) and Edwin Encarnacion (239). In 2020 the club played its home games at Sahlen Field in Buffalo, New York, because of border restrictions during the pandemic. In 2025 the historical record shows an American League pennant and a division title.

The leaders in franchise history include Dave Stieb (175 wins), Roy Halladay (148 wins), Tom Henke (217 saves), Carlos Delgado (336 home runs) and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (183 home runs through 2025). Guerrero Jr. was born in Montreal, the son of the Expos' Guerrero.

The two clubs' ballparks

The parks tell the story of how each club tried to solve the problem of baseball in a cold climate and a large market. The figures are the best season attendance for each park in the historical record.

Two things stand out. The Blue Jays' 4,057,947 in 1993, in SkyDome, is the highest single-season attendance for either club and came in the year of the second title. And the Expos' best season in the Olympic Stadium, at about 2.3 million, was well below what the Blue Jays drew in their best years in SkyDome.

More Canadians who reached the majors

Beyond the four hitters and one pitcher in the table, the historical record carries other long careers. Jason Bay hit 222 home runs, Russell Martin 191 and Corey Koskie 124. On the pitching side, Ryan Dempster won 132 games and struck out 2,075 batters, Kirk McCaskill won 106, Reggie Cleveland 105 and John Hiller 87, and James Paxton and Jeff Francis each won more than 70. These totals count American and National League games only. About half of the 248 Canadian-born players in the record come from Ontario, 122 of them, and the next two provinces, British Columbia and Quebec, supply 40 and 33.

The geography follows the climate and the population. Ontario has the largest population and the longest tradition of organized baseball, and British Columbia has the mildest winters, which allow a longer outdoor season for young players. That explanation is a reasonable guess rather than a finding of the data, and the figures do not prove it.

The Canadian game beyond the majors

Professional baseball in Canada is larger than the two major-league clubs. The Intercounty Baseball League in Ontario, which dates to 1919, is one of the oldest senior leagues in the country, and the Vancouver Canadians are a Blue Jays affiliate in the Northwest League. The Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame is in St. Marys, Ontario, and honors players, builders and others.

Canada also competes internationally. The national team has played in the World Baseball Classic, and our history of the WBC covers the tournament's growth. For other countries' histories, see baseball in Italy, baseball in Australia and baseball at the Olympics. Players from Asia reach the majors by a different route, described in our article on the posting system.

What the database cannot tell you

The historical record shows where a player was born, not where he learned the game. A player born in Canada who grew up in the United States, or the reverse, is counted by birth. The database also leaves out the senior leagues, junior programs and club teams where most Canadians play, and it has nothing on attendance for non-major-league clubs. For the Canadian game below the majors, the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and the national governing body are better sources.

Common questions

Which Canadian clubs have won the World Series? Only the Toronto Blue Jays, in 1992 and 1993.

What happened to the Expos? They moved to Washington after the 2004 season and became the Washington Nationals.

Who is the best Canadian-born player? By the historical figures, Fergie Jenkins (284 wins, 3,192 strikeouts) leads the pitchers and Larry Walker (383 home runs, 2,160 hits) leads the hitters, and both are in the Hall of Fame.

Has the Expos' record been preserved? Yes. The Washington club's record in the database includes all the Montreal years.

Where to go next

For the current Blue Jays, visit the Toronto Blue Jays team page, and for the wider picture see the international section and the world baseball topic page. For the winter side of the game, winter leagues and player development explains where many players refine their skills.