Toronto Blue Jays ‘spiritual guardian’ from Sask. now a part of team history

Lea Vandesype’s journal, chronicling her final years as a devoted Blue Jays fan, is now preserved at the team’s headquarters. Jacob Carr has more.

To say Lea Vandesype was a die-hard Toronto Blue Jays fan would be an understatement.

Vandesype passed away in January of 2023. However, during the final years of her life she kept journal logs of every single Blue Jays game.

Lea’s son and fellow Blue Jays fan Brent Vandesype, said she refused to miss even a pitch.

“She wouldn’t miss, she would give us heck if we stopped by after work and started talking to her and she missed a play.”

Despite being one of the biggest Jays fans around, Lea was not afraid to let her true feelings be known if the team wasn’t pulling their weight.

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Her final journal entry was a scathing review of a 2022 American League wild card series loss to the Seattle Mariners where the Blue Jays blew a seven-run lead.

“Basically up 8 to 1, you go and lose it, how pathetic, unbelievable. Like I said, she didn’t pull any punches,” Brent said.

After his mother passed, Brent made it his mission to get her last journal into the hands of the Blue Jays.

He was able to get in touch with Jessica Bassitt, the wife of Blue Jays pitcher Chris Bassitt, and arranged to turn over the journal during a Toronto home game on May 17th.

But on May 8th, Brent’s wife Michelle sent Jessica a text message saying that the journal was going to bring the team good luck.

That prediction could not have been more spot on.

From May 8th on, Toronto tied the Milwaukee Brewers for the best record in Major League Baseball (MLB) with 78 wins and 48 losses.

“I truly believe that mom and her love for the Jays ... just to overturn the last game she saw, she was maybe like a spiritual guardian,” Brent added.

Toronto would then go on a storybook playoff run, defeating the New York Yankees and Seattle Mariners to claim the American League pennant, before a gut-wrenching game seven loss in the World Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Despite the agonizing ending to the season for Jays fans, Brent believes that his mother has some unfinished business with the team.

“Too many things fell in place to be a coincidence. And I guarantee she won’t settle for this. Maybe she celebrated a little too early, maybe she got into the red wine, turned it back for a second,” Brent added.

“Those very close calls in the ninth inning went the other way. She’s not going to lay back on that, she’s going to be back next year and she’s going to see us to a championship.”