July 29, 1985 – Tom Henke made Toronto Blue Jays debut

July 29, 2025

By Kevin Glew  

Cooperstowners in Canada 

Forty years ago today, the Toronto Blue Jays became legitimate World Series contenders. 

At least that’s what the team’s longtime fans and many of the players from the 1985 Blue Jays squad will tell you. 

On July 29, 1985, a hard-throwing, 6-foot-5, bespectacled right-hander named Tom Henke emerged from the Blue Jays’ bullpen for the first time. 

With the Blue Jays and Orioles tied 3-3 after eight innings at Memorial Stadium, it was Henke, just called up from triple-A, who manager Bobby Cox summoned to replace Jimmy Key in the ninth. 

Not a rookie

To be clear, Henke wasn’t a raw rookie. He was 27 with 41 relief appearances with the Texas Rangers in the previous three seasons.  And the flame-throwing reliever had been otherworldly with the Blue Jays’ triple-A Syracuse Chiefs to begin the season, allowing just 13 hits in 51 1/3 innings, while striking out 60 and posting a 0.88 ERA. 

“There’s no question at all that Henke belongs up here,” Cox told the Toronto Star the day before Henke’s debut. “I’ve never seen everybody – scouts and other people in baseball – talk about a player the way they’ve been talking about him.” 

And all that talk was well-warranted. 

In his Blue Jays debut, Henke would not permit a hit in two scoreless innings, while striking out two Orioles.  

Blue Jays second baseman Damaso Garcia, meanwhile, belted a solo home run in the top of the 10^th to give the Blue Jays a 4-3 victory – and Henke a win. 

“I wasn’t nervous at all,” Henke told the Toronto Star after the game. “Well, maybe one little butterfly. I’ve just been on a roll all year and this was just carrying it on. I felt very natural out there. I really didn’t think about being back in the majors at all.  

“I gotta be thankful though, that Bobby saw fit to put me in there right away, in that kind of situation, too. It gave me a lot of confidence, where I would’ve started getting nervous riding the bench wondering when I was ever going to get in.” 

Cox was impressed by Henke’s performance. 

“I’ve just been given a great idea of what’s been going on down in Syracuse all this time,” Cox told the Toronto Star. “It’s a pressure situation, it’s a packed house, he’s in against one of the best hitting clubs in baseball and all he does is go out and throw strikes – strikes that were moving.” 

Recalled after Clancy injury

Despite his dominance in triple-A, Henke had only been recalled after Jim Clancy had been placed on the 15-day disabled list with a shoulder injury.  

When he joined the big league club, Henke was not being touted as a replacement for closer Bill Caudill, whom the Blue Jays had paid a steep price for (Dave Collins and Alfredo Griffin) when acquiring him from the Oakland A’s the previous December.  

Though he had been inconsistent, Caudill still had 13 saves and had pitched well since the All-Star break. 

But Henke’s excellence made it impossible to ignore him. In his second outing with the Blue Jays, he, again, tossed two scoreless outings and picked up a win. In his third, he notched his first save as a Blue Jay. And before he knew it, he had three wins and three saves and had not surrendered a run in his first six appearances with the Blue Jays. 

“I knew I could pitch up here,” Henke told the Toronto Star. “I’m just glad the Blue Jays have given me that chance.” 

Henke put together 11 consecutive scoreless outings to begin his Blue Jays career. And when Caudill struggled again in mid-August, Cox began giving the ball to Henke in save opportunities. The big righty responded by posting a 1.53 ERA and recording eight saves in 11 appearances that month. 

Credit to Widmar

Henke credited much of his success to Blue Jays pitching coach Al Widmar who worked with him on his delivery and his secondary pitches. 

“I used to rare back and fling myself all over the place so I’d wind up almost facing centre field,” Henke told the Toronto Star in mid-August. “Al showed me how to tuck my glove against my side so that my whole body came together as I threw, in a neater upside down V. It worked. 

“When my slider and curve started zipping in where I wanted them, I found I could blow the fastball past more people. They couldn’t afford to look for it anymore. Al made me a more complete pitcher. That’s the difference in me.” 

It also made Henke the first truly reliable closer in Blue Jays’ history and Blue Jays fans, haunted by the bullpen woes of previous seasons, loved him and they showed it when he returned from his initial road trip with the club. 

“One of my favourite moments in my Blue Jays career had to be when we came back from that road trip, and I pitched for the first time in front of the Toronto fans at Exhibition Stadium and they gave me a standing ovation,” Henke told me back in 2023. 

Henke finished the 1985 season with 2.03 ERA and 13 saves, with 42 strikeouts in 40 innings, in 28 games. In the process, he helped Blue Jays win a franchise-record 99 regular season games and their first division title. 

In 2023, Ernie Whitt told me the difference between the 1984 Blue Jays who won 89 games and the 1985 team was Henke. 

“Once we brought Tom Henke up, when we had the lead going into the ninth inning, we were going to win that game, whereas in 1984, we battled, but we didn’t have anyone to close the games out,” said Whitt.  

“It’s a different breed coming in because you’re either going to be the goat or you’re going to be the hero. The game is on the line. Tom Henke was awesome with what he did and how he handled the situation. He was just a tremendous teammate. I have nothing but the ultimate respect for him.”  

Greatest reliever in Blue Jays history

The rest, as they say, is history.  

Henke evolved into the Blue Jays greatest reliever. 

In his eight seasons with the Blue Jays, he collected 217 saves – that’s nearly 100 more than Duane Ward who’s second on the club’s all-time list. 

And for pitchers that have thrown at least 500 innings for the Blue Jays, Henke is No. 1 in ERA (2.48), strikeouts per nine innings (10.295), Walks and Hits per Innings Pitched (WHIP) (1.025) and lowest hits per nine innings (6.570). 

And to think it all started 40 years ago today when that hard-throwing, 6-foot-5, bespectacled right-hander emerged from the Blue Jays’ bullpen for the first time.