On opening day, Anthony Partipilo — the Saskatchewan Roughriders’ Chief Brand Officer — glances out his office window at Mosaic Stadium and sees an expansive field that is almost entirely enveloped in snow.
But there is nonetheless a buzz, a feeling of anticipation, a comforting notion that the season is finally, joyfully here.
Partipilo, you see, is a baseball fan.
Moreover, he is someone who spent nearly 13 years with the Toronto Blue Jays before bringing his expertise to the Roughriders and the Canadian Football League in April of 2018.
Previously, he had been the Blue Jays’ Managing Director, Merchandising, before being promoted to the role of Vice-President, Marketing and Merchandising.
As much as baseball was a vocation, it was — and always will be — a passion.
So he longs for and loves opening day. And he therefore savoured the events of Thursday, when the 2023 Major League Baseball season began on 15 fronts — including in St. Louis, where the Cardinals played host to his beloved Blue Jays on Thursday afternoon.
“It’s the day of gratefulness — gratefulness that we have this amazing game,” Partipilo reflects. “We’re grateful for all the years and all the great experiences that baseball has brought us as fans and players.
“Whether it’s fans, whether it’s players or whether it’s staff, they all come together on that day to not only celebrate, but also to thank the world for baseball and demonstrate the passion that we all have for the game.
“I feel that, especially in this province, football is exactly that for us. One of the things that we are focused on very much this year is bringing back that sense of joy that football is back and doing it in a community way. It’s a communal experience where we all come together.”
Partipilo has witnessed and appreciated such an experience first-hand in Canada’s largest metropolitan area — one that has six times the population of the entire province of Saskatchewan.
“Part of the home opener in Toronto, when we were there for the Blue Jays, was here was this massive city with people oftentimes going about their lives independently and with not much in the way of social interaction, other than small social interactions with friends,” Partipilo says. “Other than that, in Toronto you didn’t walk down the street and say hi to people. There was very little eye contact.
“When it was the home opener, it was your permission to reach out and say ‘hi!’ and high-five people and look at people and smile. You saw it on the concourses. You saw it in the stands. The sense of camaraderie that ‘we are in this together’ was incredibly powerful.”
The appetite for such a day, such a scene, is whetted every February with four simple, yet soothing, words: Pitchers and catchers report.
“It foreshadows what’s to come,” Partipilo says. “It’s this love of the game that has been missed. Even though it has only been missed for three or four months, it has been missed.
“It’s this family member, this loved one, that has been away. Now they come back and you’re greeting them at the airport. You run up and you give them a big hug.
“They’re there. He’s here, she’s here, or they’re here. It’s that same kind of feeling — that our lives are better when they’re here than when they’re not. We missed them.”
The Blue Jays will actually be part of three home openers this year — those of the Cardinals and Los Angeles Angels, for starters. The latter event is set for April 7.
The Detroit Tigers are to visit Rogers Centre for the Blue Jays’ home opener on April 11 — precisely two months before the Roughriders are to begin their regular season June 11 against the host Edmonton Elks.
“There’s one thing that the opening ceremonies have in common — the welcoming of the fans, and the welcoming of the players and the team from the fans,” Partipilo says.
“I recall from my time with the Blue Jays when we did a video that was produced for an upcoming season. It was in the form of a commercial — long-form, short-form — that had aired for a few weeks on Sportsnet. There was no voice-over narrative. It was a musical track and it was the players.
“The players were getting off the bus and they were walking single file to the stadium and they were going into the clubhouse. You could tell their minds were focused. They weren’t talking to each other, but there was this sense of determination on their faces as they walked in. This was actual authentic footage.”
The authentic reaction of the fans was so eruptive that it still resonates with Partipilo.
“We showed an aerial view of Rogers Centre and then we came down to the players entering,” he continues. “There were 45,500 people in the dome. The dome was closed. There was silence.
“The video began and the music track began. Everyone in the stadium started clapping and yelling and standing up for a video when they saw the players on that giant screen.
“It gives me goose bumps to this day.”
Partipilo was in a large suite at the time, interacting with guests of Rogers Communications Inc. — the Blue Jays’ owner.
“There were about 200 people in the suite,” he recalls. “I couldn’t see the bowl from where I was, because I was behind a concrete wall, but we heard this roar.
“The game hadn’t started yet and we all ran out to have a look at the bowl. We saw this place just erupt — this stadium that had been empty for months. All these people brought it alive. It was a moment of inspiration and pride.
“I know that the opening kickoff for football, especially in Rider Nation, can be exactly that. We can have that same moment.”
And who knows? The snow might even be gone by then.
