Former Blue Jays reflect on 9/11: ‘It hit us all very hard’

TORONTO — After an off-day in September 2001, former Blue Jays manager Buck Martinez was driving from New Jersey to Baltimore for a series against the Orioles when news of the U.S. terror attacks came across his car radio.

When he arrived in the Maryland city, uncertainty hung in the air - particularly with the team hotel so close to the Baltimore World Trade Center.

"My coaching staff all gathered in my suite glued to the TV," Martinez recalled Friday in a text message. "Everything we saw was unbelievable. It hit us all very hard."

The Toronto-Baltimore game and other Major League Baseball matchups were postponed. With air travel ruled out, the Blue Jays returned to Canada later that week via bus.

They didn't play again until a Sept. 18 home game against Baltimore, which included an extended pre-game ceremony.

"It's the only time I appreciated the crowd going, 'U.S.A.! U.S.A.!'" longtime baseball writer Richard Griffin said Friday, shortly before the Blue Jays and Orioles played at Rogers Centre on the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

That fateful morning, Blue Jays players and team staff were evacuated from their waterfront hotel after the first plane hit the World Trade Center tower in New York.

Cellphone service was poor at best. The team's travelling secretary at the time, Bart Given, remembered the panic and rumours that circulated as people milled about outside the hotel.

"You're all trying to gather information," Given said. "People have different levels of understanding of what's going on. Some hadn't really seen the news cycle yet, they're confused."

Players and team staff had recently been given BlackBerry mobile devices, he said. The technology allowed for PIN (personal identification number) to PIN messaging, which came in handy that day.

Given's device was in near-constant use. He was in charge of team transport and logistics and he would send individual PINs to others as plans developed.

"Can we get buses (home)? Will the bus drivers drive us? How many buses do we need? How many drivers do we need," he said. "I think we predicted a 12-hour drive and I wasn't sure how long we'd have to wait at the border."

Once the all-clear was given, many members of the Blue Jays' contingent went back to their rooms. Others walked a few blocks to donate blood.

"I figured that's the least we could do," said Jay Stenhouse, the Blue Jays' assistant director of public relations at the time. "You see so many people (on TV) who were hurt and injured."