The Boston Red Sox’s Danny Jansen celebrates after hitting an RBI single during the eighth inning of a baseball game against the Texas Rangers at Fenway Park, on Aug. 14 in Boston.
Charles Krupa/AP
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Charles Krupa/AP
No matter how the next Toronto Blue Jays vs. Boston Red Sox game plays out, Danny Jansen will be able to call himself a winner.
That’s because on Monday, the Red Sox catcher will be finishing a game that he started as a player on the opposing team. In doing so, Jansen will go down in Major League Baseball history as the first person to play for both teams in the same game.
The peculiar switch-up was set in motion when a game on June 26 was suspended during the second inning because of heavy rain at Boston’s Fenway Park. At the time, Jansen played for Toronto. A month later, Jansen was traded to the Red Sox, with the team hoping to both make use of his right-handed bat and strengthen its catching lineup.
Before the game was halted, Jansen was at bat for the Blue Jays. Two months later, play will resume — this time, with Jansen behind the plate and in a Red Sox jersey. The Jays will have a pinch hitter in Jansen’s place.
Red Sox manager Alex Cora reportedly confirmed on Friday that Jansen would be part of the starting lineup, replacing catcher Reese McGuire.
“Yeah he’s catching. Let’s make history,” Cora told reporters.
According to MLB.com, it would be a first for a player at the Major League level, but there’s at least one instance of a player appearing on both teams in the same game in the minor leagues. In 1986, Dale Holman played for both the Syracuse Chiefs and the Richmond Braves in a game broken up by rain.
In an interview with The Athletic published last this week, Jansen said the potential to make history “would be awesome.”
“It’s a cool thing to be part of something that lives on and is just a rarity,” he said. “I try to be in the moment as much as possible. But one day, if this happens … it’s going to be a cool thing to look back on.”
The oddity of the scenario has inspired baseball fans to muse about the wild, “only in baseball” possibilities of the game.
“The Danny jansen thing makes me remember one of my favourite baseball quirks: it is technically possible to strike yourself out,” wrote one user on X.
When the game resumes, the pinch hitter taking Jansen’s place will inherit Jansen’s one strike on the count. If the pinch hitter goes on to strike out, Jansen was relieved to know, that strikeout won’t show up in his stats, according to The Athletic. The pinch hitter taking Jansen’s place will own whatever happens when the at-bat resumes on Monday afternoon.