SIMMONS: Stunning death of Duane Ward has Blue Jays in shock

Дата публикации: 19-07-2026 17:12:12

Bullpen mate Tom Henke and manager Cito Gaston reflect on sudden loss of legendary reliever

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The guys got together on Friday night, had a few laughs, told a few lies, had a drink or two and then Duane Ward left early.

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He said he was tired.

“That wasn’t like Wardo to leave early,” Tom Henke said Sunday morning, after learning of the passing of his former bullpen mate.

“I asked him ‘Are you feeling all right?’ I didn’t like the way he looked, to be honest. I thought maybe he had a tough flight or something coming in from Vegas …

“I’m shocked right now (about his passing). How can you not be? I had supper with Wardo when he came in. We got to visit. I’m thinking now, I’m so glad I got to do that. I’m glad I got one more time with him.”

They were supposed to ride together in the parade of Blue Jays pickup trucks Saturday afternoon. Henke rode alone. “I didn’t know where he was,” he said.

Members of the Toronto Blue Jays stand for a moment of silence for former Blue Jays pitcher Duane Ward before an MLB game against the Chicago White Sox at the Rogers Centre on July 19, 2026 in Toronto. MARK BLINCH/GETTY IMAGES

By the afternoon on the day of this Blue Jays celebration, some players were asking: Where’s Wardo? By night, they knew that Ward had passed away at the age of 62.

“I thought something was wrong when he was late,” former Jays manager Cito Gaston said. “Wardo was one of those guys who was never late. He was always on time.

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‘I think about Duane Ward and I think he made my job easier. He was just a good pitcher, man. He took no prisoners on the mound. Sometimes I’d go out to the mound to talk to him just to bust his balls. I’d ask him, how are you going to get this guy out? He’d tell me to get the hell back to the dugout and that he knew what he was doing.”

They were never the closest of friends, Ward and Henke, but they were the closest of competitors in their years together with the Blue Jays. Ward made Henke better and Henke made Ward better. “We had this honest competition,” Henke said.

Former Toronto Blue Jays reliever Duane Ward works with kids at Kinsmen Field baseball park in Kanata. CHRIS MIKULA/POSTMEDIA NETWORK FILES

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   Blue Jays legend Duane Ward dead at 62

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‘He had his own way’

“Duane was his own man, though, he kept to himself a lot. You know how it is on teams, sometimes the hunters hang together, the golfers hang together, it kind of divides up into groups that way. Duane did his own thing off the field. He had his own way. We spent so much time over the years in the bullpen together but it wasn’t like I hung out with him a lot outside of baseball.”

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The champions were celebrated on Saturday afternoon, those two very different Blue Jays teams that won championships in 1992 and 1992. One title team was almost all pitching. One title team was almost all hitting.

The crimson-faced Ward was a huge part of both those World Series champions.

“We never worried about the the eighth and ninth innings when we had Henke and Ward in the bullpen,” Gaston said on Saturday. “It was tougher in ’93, though. Ward was special for us then.”

That was the year Ward saved 45 games, most in Jays history.

And he proved to be a giant factor in the two World Series won by the club.

Mr. Reliable in World Series and beyond

In the series against the Phillies in ‘93, Ward saved Game 1, saved Game 4 and was the winning pitcher on the Joe Carter home run night of Game 6.

The year before, he was the winning pitcher in Games 2 and 3 of the World Series against his former team, the Atlanta Braves.

The Jays needed eight wins in the World Series over two years and Ward was the winning pitcher in three of those victories, registering saves in two other games.

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“He loved being a Blue Jay as a lot of us did,” Henke said. “I know Duane loved his time here. I’m still kind of numb by all this. We just visited. The next morning, he didn’t show up and some of us were asking people to check on him.

“We’d see each other from time to time. At events or something. He came to my golf tournament a couple of years ago. We were friends but at the same time we were professional rivals in a way.

“You never took that part personally. That’s baseball. There’s always someone looking to take your job. Wardo pushed me and it made me better, I pushed him and it made him better. It helped both of us stay on top of our games.”

The camaraderie returned to so many of these former Blue Jays on Friday night and Saturday afternoon with many heading home or elsewhere on Sunday. “In a way, it’s like you never left,” Henke said. “I go back to ’92 with so many of those guys and back as far as ’85 with Rance (Mulliniks). This takes you back and then it stops you.”

“What I noticed on the weekend was that as much I think I know the players, I’ll never know them the way they know each other. It’s just like that between manager and players. But I can tell you this, Wardo was as good a man as he was a pitcher. He did a lot for the Blue Jays to make us special.”

It stops you cold and with overwhelming sadness and shock when a beloved teammate and friend is found dead at the young age of 62.

“I feel sorry for the family,” Gaston said. “And I feel sorry for all of us feeling this loss.”

ssimmons@postmedia.com

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