The Toronto Blue Jays and Seattle Mariners are expansion siblings.

In 1977, Major League Baseball added the Mariners and Blue Jays as the 25th and 26th expansion teams. Aside from the 90s and the early 2000s, the Mariners haven’t done a whole lot since joining the league all those years ago. The Blue Jays won back-to-back World Series in 1992 and 1993, then went 22 seasons before making the postseason again.
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The two teams have met just once in the postseason, back in 2022 when the Mariners swept the Blue Jays in two games. That’s the extent of their on-field shared history, unless you count the Blue Jays’ home games in Seattle during the summer.
However, the two teams have a lengthy track record of making trades with one another, 20 in fact. We won’t cover every single trade in this edition of Throwback Thursday, but we’ll look at the notable trades between the two teams.
Let’s dig in!
<h2>The first notable trade </h2>
The first trade between the two teams was early in the two franchises&#8217; history. On September 14, 1977, the Mariners purchased John Hale from the Jays. With that being said, the first notable trade between the two teams came 18 years later, when the Jays traded Edwin Hurtado and Paul Menhart to the Mariners for Miguel Cairo and Bill Risley.
Hurtado pitched 144.1 innings in the big leagues, 77.2 of which were with the Blue Jays, where he had a 5.45 ERA and a 5.83 FIP. He didn’t do much better with the Mariners, and he was out of the big leagues in 1997. Menhart had a similar career, posting a 4.92 ERA and a 5.34 FIP in 78.2 innings pitched with the Jays in 1995. He didn’t perform well with the Mariners in 1996 and was out of the league after the 1997 season.
Cairo had a lengthy big league career, playing from the 1996 season until 2012. However, only 30 of his 4,392 plate appearances came with the Jays, where he slashed .222/.300/.296. Cairo played for the the Chicago Cubs, the Tampa Bay Devils Rays, the St. Louis Cardinals, the New York Mets and Yankees, the Seattle Mariners, the Philadelphia Phillies, and the Cincinnati Reds.
Risley made his big league debut with the Montréal Expos in 1992 before finding his way to the Mariners in 1994. After two seasons there with good results, Risley posted a 3.89 ERA and a 5.76 FIP in 41.2 innings pitched. His career fizzled out from there, posting a 5.27 ERA and a 5.35 FIP in 54.2.
It was a notable, but small trade. Cairo had the longest career, but there were four big leaguers involved in this trade. 
<h2>The José Cruz Jr. trade</h2>
On Jul. 31, 1997, the Jays traded Paul Spoljaric and Mike Timlin to the Mariners for José Cruz, the third overall pick in the 1995 draft. Spoljaric, a Canadian, pitched 277.1 innings in the big leagues, posting a 5.52 ERA and a 4.91 FIP. Parts of four seasons were with the Jays, where he had a 4.31 ERA in 150.1 innings pitched.
Timlin had a lengthy career, posting a 3.63 ERA and a 3.94 FIP in 1204.1 innings pitched, playing for the Jays, Mariners, Baltimore Orioles, St. Louis Cardinals, Philadelphia Phillies, and Boston Red Sox. He won four World Series in his career.
Cruz Jr. found success with the Jays, hitting a career-best 31 home runs in 681 plate appearances in 2001. As a Blue Jay, he finished with 122 home runs in 2,901 plate appearances. To end his career, he played with the San Francisco Giants, Tampa Bay Devil Rays, Arizona Diamondbacks, Boston Red Sox, Los Angeles Dodgers, San Diego Padres, and Houston Astros.
<h2>The Brandon Morrow trade</h2>
Two days before Christmas in 2009, the Jays traded Brandon League and minor league pitcher Johermyn Chavez to the Mariners in exchange for Brandon Morrow. Chavez never pitched in the big leagues and most recently pitched in the Venezuelan Winter League in 2017.
With the Jays, League pitched 202.1 innings with a 4.09 ERA and a 4.30 FIP. He spent three seasons with the Mariners, posting a 3.26 ERA and a 3.43 FIP in 185 innings pitched, earning an All-Star nomination in 2011. League finished his career with the Los Angeles Dodgers from 2012 to 2014.
Morrow is the most notable piece of this trade, as he had a 4.40 ERA and a 3.70 FIP in 538 innings pitched with the Jays from 2010 until 2014. In 2010, he was one out away from the second no-hitter in Jays’ history, striking out 17 in that game. Morrow finished his career with the San Diego Padres, Dodgers, and Chicago Cubs, finding success as a reliever in the backend of his career.
<h2>Jays acquire a Canadian for J.A. Happ</h2>
On Dec. 3, the Jays traded J.A. Happ to the Mariners for Canadian outfielder Michael Saunders.
Happ had two stints with the Jays, but in his last season of his first stint, he had a 4.22 ERA and a 4.26 FIP in 158 innings pitched. Happ found his way back to the Jays for the 2016 season, where he had a .317 ERA and a 3.96 FIP in 195 innings, helping the Jays return to the postseason for a second consecutive season. Happ was eventually traded to the New York Yankees before the 2018 trade deadline and finished his career in 2021.
Saunders only had 36 plate appearances in 2015, but earned a trip to the 2016 All-Star game as he slashed .253/.338/.478 with 24 home runs. The Canadian’s final season in the big leagues was in 2017, splitting his time with the Blue Jays and Philadelphia Phillies.
<h2>An important trade for a reliever</h2>
On Jul. 26, 2016, the Jays traded Drew Storen to the Mariners for reliever Joanquín Beniot. Storen pitched just 33.1 innings with the Jays. Post-trade, he pitched just 73 more innings in the big leagues. 
Benoit pitched even fewer innings with the Jays, but oh boy was he ever nails. In his 23.2 innings pitched, he had a minuscule 0.38 ERA and a 2.81 FIP with a 25.8 K%. Unfortunately, he didn’t pitch during the Jays&#8217; postseason run as he tore his calf in a game in late September during a bench-clearing brawl with the Yankees.
Both players never pitched another inning after 2017, but the Jays won this trade.
<h2>Jays trade Teoscar Hernández to Mariners for Erik Swanson and Adam Macko</h2>
On Nov. 16, 2022, the Jays traded fan-favourite Teoscar Hernández to the Mariners for reliever Erik Swanson and prospect Adam Macko.
It wasn’t necessarily a bad trade for the Jays, although Hernández’s power has been lacking in the lineup since the trade. As a Jay, Hernández slashed .263/.320/.503 with 129 home runs in 2,419 plate appearances.
Swanson was coming off a season where he had a 1.68 ERA and a 1.85 FIP. He had a successful 2023 with the Jays, posting a 2.97 ERA and a 3.51 FIP in 66.2 innings pitched. However, he struggled in 2024 for the first half of the season and as a whole, posted a 5.03 ERA and a 6.06 FIP in 39.1 innings pitched. He had a much better second half of the season.
<h2>Jays make two trades with Mariners before the 2024 trade deadline</h2>
And then we come to last season, where the two teams linked up on two separate trades. On Jul. 26, the Jays traded reliever Yimi García for prospects Jonatan Clase and Jacob Sharp. As you know, the Jays re-signed García, while Clase is in Triple-A and Sharp is in High-A.
Three days later, the Jays traded designated hitter Justin Turner to the Mariners in exchange for RJ Schreck. Schreck had a good start to his Jays’ career, slashing .255/.377/.521 with five home runs in 114 plate appearances. So far in 2025, he’s slashing .192/.364/.231 with no home runs in 33 plate appearances.
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Ryley Delaney is a Nation Network writer for Blue Jays Nation, Oilersnation, and FlamesNation. They can be followed on Twitter @Ryley__Delaney.
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The Toronto Blue Jays and Seattle Mariners are expansion siblings.



In 1977, Major League Baseball added the Mariners and Blue Jays as the 25th and 26th expansion teams. Aside from the 90s and the early 2000s, the Mariners haven’t done a whole lot since joining the league all those years ago. The Blue Jays won back-to-back World Series in 1992 and 1993, then went 22 seasons before making the postseason again.
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The two teams have met just once in the postseason, back in 2022 when the Mariners swept the Blue Jays in two games. That’s the extent of their on-field shared history, unless you count the Blue Jays’ home games in Seattle during the summer.

However, the two teams have a lengthy track record of making trades with one another, 20 in fact. We won’t cover every single trade in this edition of Throwback Thursday, but we’ll look at the notable trades between the two teams.

Let’s dig in!
<h2>The first notable trade </h2>
The first trade between the two teams was early in the two franchises' history. On September 14, 1977, the Mariners purchased John Hale from the Jays. With that being said, the first notable trade between the two teams came 18 years later, when the Jays traded Edwin Hurtado and Paul Menhart to the Mariners for Miguel Cairo and Bill Risley.

Hurtado pitched 144.1 innings in the big leagues, 77.2 of which were with the Blue Jays, where he had a 5.45 ERA and a 5.83 FIP. He didn’t do much better with the Mariners, and he was out of the big leagues in 1997. Menhart had a similar career, posting a 4.92 ERA and a 5.34 FIP in 78.2 innings pitched with the Jays in 1995. He didn’t perform well with the Mariners in 1996 and was out of the league after the 1997 season.

Cairo had a lengthy big league career, playing from the 1996 season until 2012. However, only 30 of his 4,392 plate appearances came with the Jays, where he slashed .222/.300/.296. Cairo played for the the Chicago Cubs, the Tampa Bay Devils Rays, the St. Louis Cardinals, the New York Mets and Yankees, the Seattle Mariners, the Philadelphia Phillies, and the Cincinnati Reds.

Risley made his big league debut with the Montréal Expos in 1992 before finding his way to the Mariners in 1994. After two seasons there with good results, Risley posted a 3.89 ERA and a 5.76 FIP in 41.2 innings pitched. His career fizzled out from there, posting a 5.27 ERA and a 5.35 FIP in 54.2.

It was a notable, but small trade. Cairo had the longest career, but there were four big leaguers involved in this trade. 
<h2>The José Cruz Jr. trade</h2>
On Jul. 31, 1997, the Jays traded Paul Spoljaric and Mike Timlin to the Mariners for José Cruz, the third overall pick in the 1995 draft. Spoljaric, a Canadian, pitched 277.1 innings in the big leagues, posting a 5.52 ERA and a 4.91 FIP. Parts of four seasons were with the Jays, where he had a 4.31 ERA in 150.1 innings pitched.

Timlin had a lengthy career, posting a 3.63 ERA and a 3.94 FIP in 1204.1 innings pitched, playing for the Jays, Mariners, Baltimore Orioles, St. Louis Cardinals, Philadelphia Phillies, and Boston Red Sox. He won four World Series in his career.

Cruz Jr. found success with the Jays, hitting a career-best 31 home runs in 681 plate appearances in 2001. As a Blue Jay, he finished with 122 home runs in 2,901 plate appearances. To end his career, he played with the San Francisco Giants, Tampa Bay Devil Rays, Arizona Diamondbacks, Boston Red Sox, Los Angeles Dodgers, San Diego Padres, and Houston Astros.
<h2>The Brandon Morrow trade</h2>
Two days before Christmas in 2009, the Jays traded Brandon League and minor league pitcher Johermyn Chavez to the Mariners in exchange for Brandon Morrow. Chavez never pitched in the big leagues and most recently pitched in the Venezuelan Winter League in 2017.

With the Jays, League pitched 202.1 innings with a 4.09 ERA and a 4.30 FIP. He spent three seasons with the Mariners, posting a 3.26 ERA and a 3.43 FIP in 185 innings pitched, earning an All-Star nomination in 2011. League finished his career with the Los Angeles Dodgers from 2012 to 2014.

Morrow is the most notable piece of this trade, as he had a 4.40 ERA and a 3.70 FIP in 538 innings pitched with the Jays from 2010 until 2014. In 2010, he was one out away from the second no-hitter in Jays’ history, striking out 17 in that game. Morrow finished his career with the San Diego Padres, Dodgers, and Chicago Cubs, finding success as a reliever in the backend of his career.
<h2>Jays acquire a Canadian for J.A. Happ</h2>
On Dec. 3, the Jays traded J.A. Happ to the Mariners for Canadian outfielder Michael Saunders.

Happ had two stints with the Jays, but in his last season of his first stint, he had a 4.22 ERA and a 4.26 FIP in 158 innings pitched. Happ found his way back to the Jays for the 2016 season, where he had a .317 ERA and a 3.96 FIP in 195 innings, helping the Jays return to the postseason for a second consecutive season. Happ was eventually traded to the New York Yankees before the 2018 trade deadline and finished his career in 2021.

Saunders only had 36 plate appearances in 2015, but earned a trip to the 2016 All-Star game as he slashed .253/.338/.478 with 24 home runs. The Canadian’s final season in the big leagues was in 2017, splitting his time with the Blue Jays and Philadelphia Phillies.
<h2>An important trade for a reliever</h2>
On Jul. 26, 2016, the Jays traded Drew Storen to the Mariners for reliever Joanquín Beniot. Storen pitched just 33.1 innings with the Jays. Post-trade, he pitched just 73 more innings in the big leagues. 

Benoit pitched even fewer innings with the Jays, but oh boy was he ever nails. In his 23.2 innings pitched, he had a minuscule 0.38 ERA and a 2.81 FIP with a 25.8 K%. Unfortunately, he didn’t pitch during the Jays' postseason run as he tore his calf in a game in late September during a bench-clearing brawl with the Yankees.

Both players never pitched another inning after 2017, but the Jays won this trade.
<h2>Jays trade Teoscar Hernández to Mariners for Erik Swanson and Adam Macko</h2>
On Nov. 16, 2022, the Jays traded fan-favourite Teoscar Hernández to the Mariners for reliever Erik Swanson and prospect Adam Macko.

It wasn’t necessarily a bad trade for the Jays, although Hernández’s power has been lacking in the lineup since the trade. As a Jay, Hernández slashed .263/.320/.503 with 129 home runs in 2,419 plate appearances.

Swanson was coming off a season where he had a 1.68 ERA and a 1.85 FIP. He had a successful 2023 with the Jays, posting a 2.97 ERA and a 3.51 FIP in 66.2 innings pitched. However, he struggled in 2024 for the first half of the season and as a whole, posted a 5.03 ERA and a 6.06 FIP in 39.1 innings pitched. He had a much better second half of the season.
<h2>Jays make two trades with Mariners before the 2024 trade deadline</h2>
And then we come to last season, where the two teams linked up on two separate trades. On Jul. 26, the Jays traded reliever Yimi García for prospects Jonatan Clase and Jacob Sharp. As you know, the Jays re-signed García, while Clase is in Triple-A and Sharp is in High-A.

Three days later, the Jays traded designated hitter Justin Turner to the Mariners in exchange for RJ Schreck. Schreck had a good start to his Jays’ career, slashing .255/.377/.521 with five home runs in 114 plate appearances. So far in 2025, he’s slashing .192/.364/.231 with no home runs in 33 plate appearances.

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Ryley Delaney is a Nation Network writer for Blue Jays Nation, Oilersnation, and FlamesNation. They can be followed on Twitter @Ryley__Delaney.

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