TORONTO -- Teoscar Hernandez stood at the right-field foul line with his Seattle Mariners teammates just before Friday night's game with his eyes fixed on the Rogers Centre video board.
About 90 feet away, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. was by himself near second base, hands on his hips, looking up.
A one-minute tribute of highlights from Hernandez's time with the Blue Jays was being shown on the screen, concluding with the words, "Thank you Teo."
It elicited a standing ovation from the crowd and, as the former Blue Jays right-fielder waved to show his appreciation, Guerrero Jr. also put his hands together.
Players returning to their old stomping grounds is commonplace, but this felt just a little different. Perhaps a little more emotional. Hernandez and his trademark smile were almost a visual hallmark of Blue Jays clubs from the past several years.
Guerrero Jr. has said when he’s not playing, he'll often turn on Mariners games to see how his close friend and fellow Dominican is faring.
Hernandez, speaking to reporters before Friday's series opener between the Mariners and Blue Jays, said that's mutual.
"The same thing," Hernandez said. "I spent so much time with that group. And I feel for them — I want them to be good and I want them to be great."
Hernandez was shipped to the Mariners last November in exchange for reliever Erik Swanson and minor-league pitcher Adam Macko, kicking off an eventful off-season full of transactions for the Blue Jays.
"It was not a surprise," Hernandez said of the deal, noting that he’d seen rumours on social media that he could be on the move. "I wasn't thinking it was going to be that quick, but it happened right away in the off-season. It definitely is something that you never expected, especially me — I was here for six years and spent a lot of time with the boys.
"But, it is what it is: A business. They do the best that they can to make the team better. That's the way they feel."
Asked what was going through his mind at the time of the trade, Hernandez responded: "A lot of questions, but at the end of the day, whatever I think doesn't matter. So, I take it the best way that I can take it and just keep going and do the best that I can do to help my team."
The Blue Jays acquired Hernandez in the July 2017 deal that sent left-hander Francisco Liriano to the Houston Astros. After a few middling years, he broke out during the pandemic-shortened 2020 campaign to win the first of consecutive Silver Slugger awards. He was named an all-star during the 2021 season that saw him crush 32 home runs and post a 131 OPS-plus.
In total, he launched 129 homers during his Blue Jays tenure, ranking 11th on the franchise's all-time list.
"I've known him for a while," said Blue Jays manager John Schneider. "Homers come to mind ... Throwing BP to him every day for years, that jumps out to me.
"He's such a good dude, too," Schneider added. "So, there's a lot of [memories] for sure."
Hernandez is off to a slow start with his new club, producing a slash line of .224/.260/.439 entering Friday's contest. However, his six homers trailed only Jarred Kelenic (seven) for the team lead.
The right-fielder says he's quickly meshed with his new teammates.
"The group that they have here is just basically the way I am," said Hernandez. "They want to have fun. A lot of jokes around the clubhouse, playing around. And that's the way I am. I'm a guy who likes to be happy, to be enjoying the moment and doing what we do.
"And, at the end of the day, we spend too much time together. So, that's the way I think is the best way to get through everything — the bad ones and the good ones during the season. And that's why I think I felt so welcomed when I got here."
Friday's game, of course, was a rematch of last year's wild-card series in which the Mariners stunningly came back from an 8-1 deficit in Game 2 to eliminate the Blue Jays. Hernandez, who clubbed two homers in the affair, says his teammates enjoy ribbing him about being on the losing side of it.
"They always say, ‘sorry,’ before they start talking about it," he said with a laugh. "But at the end of the day, it's baseball. At the end of the game, somebody has to win, somebody has to lose. That day, they played better than us."
While Hernandez flashed his smile when talking about Mariners teammates, he did express that he "missed all the guys" on the other side. As well, he admitted there was once a time when he thought he'd be a Blue Jay for life.
"You always want to think that way," he said. "I'm not the guy that wants to be bouncing around 10 different teams. I wanted to stay on and just stay that way as long as I can and try to do my thing."
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