Pillar reflects on being longest-serving Jay
Centre fielder takes pride in helping younger players
TORONTO — It was five years ago on Tuesday that Kevin Pillar walked into the Toronto Blue Jays clubhouse for the first time.
Then 24 years old, his call-up to baseball’s big leagues came when Colby Rasmus was placed on the disabled list. Pillar cracking the major leagues was somewhat unexpected. A 32nd-round draft pick in 2011, the native of West Hills., Calif., admitted at the time that he was surprised by his rapid ascent, rising through the Blue Jays farm system in little more than two years, hitting north of .300 at every minor-league stop.
Pillar was called up ahead of Anthony Gose, then a highly touted centre-field prospect who made his major-league debut a year earlier but was struggling with the Triple-A Buffalo Bisons. Even Toronto’s then GM Alex Anthopoulos admitted they underestimated Pillar in the draft: “Clearly I could say, and I say that respectfully, we got him wrong,” he said in 2013.
To Pillar, who was given a locker in the back corner of the clubhouse that he still uses today, it was a larger-than-life experience. It wasn’t always easy to navigate.
“I wish when I got up here the first time there was some people that were a little bit more willing and able to help me out my first time here,” Pillar recalled last week, as he packed for the Jays’ current seven-game road trip. “I wasn’t even in spring training with them so even walking in here the first time was the first time I met a lot of these guys and obviously you see how big this place is, I didn’t know where a lot of things were.”
“My locker was here, Rajai Davis was (next to him) and (Jose) Reyes (around the corner). Luckily after a little bit they warmed to me a little bit and helped me out. I didn’t know where even the cage was, I didn’t even know where the bathroom was, I didn’t even know where to get my stuff.”
Pillar spent the rest of the 2013 season with the Jays, returning to the big leagues in May ’14 after starting the year with Buffalo. He was demoted in late June of that year, in part for snapping after being pinch run for in a game against the New York Yankees and throwing his bat down the tunnel in anger, but rejoined Toronto in August and has been a mainstay in the Jays lineup ever since.
Since reliever Aaron Loup was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies ahead of the trade deadline on July 31, Pillar has taken on a new title: Longest-tenured Blue Jays player. It’s not a title he expects youngsters — the likes of Ryan Borucki, Danny Jansen and Sean Reid-Foley, who have already joined Toronto’s clubhouse, as well as others expected to get the nod in the final six weeks of the season — to know he holds. There are other players with more service time than Pillar, such as Russell Martin or Curtis Granderson. Pillar isn’t that experienced just yet but he’s happy to have the title, and tries to put it to good use.
“I take a lot of pride in it,” Pillar said. “I do my part. Any time a new guy comes in here, especially a guy for the first time, I just help him out. Anything they need to know about the city, about living or just where things are at in this clubhouse, who certain people are. Not because I’m the longest tenured, just because I think that’s the right thing to do.”
Pillar also tries to lead by example. Between Sunday, when Jansen and Reid-Foley joined the team, and Wednesday, the centrefielder was 3-for-9 with a home run and three RBIs. In Sunday’s victory against the Tampa Bay Rays, he scored the winning run in the sixth with some aggressive baserunning. In Tuesday’s win against the Kansas City Royals, it was his two-run homer in the eighth that sealed the deal for the Jays.
It’s crazy, Pillar said, that he’s the club’s longest-tenured player at 29 years old, having only been with the team for five years.
“It’s just kind of (how) baseball is now, you know, the turnover is a lot higher than it used to be,” he said.
As he helps new players settle into life in his “home away from home,” Pillar is also keen to learn more about the city. It took him a long time to venture outside of the immediate area around the Rogers Centre, but he knows the city has much more to offer. The Danforth, for example, is on his list. He learned about the area after the mass shooting last month that left two dead — including a fan of his, 18-year-old Reese Fallon — and 13 injured, but has also learned there is more to the neighbourhood than the tragedy it suffered.
“I’ve never been to the Danforth,” Pillar said.
“It’s unfortunate that’s the way that it was brought to my attention but it’s somewhere that I’d like to visit. I know it’s a pretty happening spot, good food and entertainment.”
His daughter, Kobie, was born last fall and, this being her first season in Toronto, it’s important to Pillar that he makes it feel as homey as possible considering this is just about the only home she’s ever known. He has learned about some different parts of the city for the 10-month-old’s sake, places he may have just walked by or driven by before.
“I know where the splash pads are.”