On Saturday, Buck Martinez became the 12th member of the Toronto Blue Jays’ Hall of Excellence.

Formerly named the Level of Excellence, Martinez joined names like José Bautista, Roy Halladay, Cito Gaston, Joe Carter, Dave Stieb, and plenty of other franchise icons.  Martinez is the first inductee since the name change, as well as the first player inducted since Bautista was back in 2023.

There are still plenty of deserving candidates for the 13th member of the Hall of Excellence, with the organization’s website even featuring a vote which includes 14 other players. Let’s take at seven more deserving candidates.

Martinez did it all in the organization. During his playing days, he served as the team’s catcher from 1981 until his retirement following the 1986 season. Martinez immediately join the Blue Jays’ broadcast team, a job he held in several stints until his retirement following the 2025 season. One of those breaks was because he managed the team in the 2001 and 2002 seasons.

Of the 12 players in the Hall of Excellence, Martinez is lone individual to do all three of these jobs, though he did miss out on serving as the team’s general manager. Martinez is the second broadcaster to be inducted into the Hall of Excellence, second to only Tom Cheek. Cheek served as the team’s radio play-by-play man from their first season in 1977 until he retired in 2004, tragically passing away in late 2005.

Another broadcaster deserving a spot in the team’s Hall of Excellence is Cheek’s broadcast partner, Jerry Howarth. The duo were paired up for the 1982 season until Cheek’s retirement. Howarth spent another 13 seasons as the team’s play-by-play broadcaster until his retirement before the 2018 season.

The Blue Jays have had plenty of notable power-hitters in their history. Carlos Delgado leads the pack with 336, followed by Bautista’s 288. Both players are already in the Hall of Excellence, but the third-placed Edwin Encarnación is not. The next position player to be inducted is the designated hitter, as Encarnación ranks third all-time in Blue Jays’ OPS, fifth in RBIs, and second in all-time slugging percentage.

Encarnación deserves to be honoured alongside Bautista, as the pair of sluggers spent the prime of their years together. Fans who grew up watching the team in the 2010s want it, and the designated hitter has a good claim to be one of next individuals inducted.

Like Bautista, Encarnación’s best moment is one of the most memorable home runs in franchise history, walking off the Baltimore Orioles in the bottom of the ninth of the 2016 Wild Card game.

While celebrating the 1992 and 1993 World Series runs for the Blue Jays, Devon White is a player who gets constantly overlooked.

While he wasn’t known for as many memorable offensive moments as Encarnación, Joe Carter, or Bautista, he still put up respectable seasons in Toronto, capped off with hitting 42 doubles in 1993. Where White made up for it was his fantastic glove. Five of White’s seven Gold Gloves came in Toronto, and he was remembered for one of the best catches in franchise history during the 1992 World Series.

With two runners on base, David Justice hit a ball to the deepest part of centre field, where White ran it down and basically jumped off the wall to make the catch. He managed to throw the ball back into the infield to turn a double play off Terry Pendleton. Despite the call not going the Blue Jays’ way, the team almost managed to turn a triple play when third baseman Kelly Gruber tagged Deion Sanders.

In 1993, White  hit .292 in the World Series against the Philadelphia Phillies and was second on the team in OPS with a 1.115 to Paul Molitor’s 1.378. With the Hall of Excellence showcasing Gold Glove award winners, and with the team paying tribute to the back-to-back championship teams, putting Devo up there is something a lot of fans know is a when more than an if.

When honouring past Blue Jays, Jesse Barfield is someone a lot of original fans grew to love. One third of the Killer B’s with George Bell and Lloyd Moseby, Barfield helped contribute to turning the Blue Jays from an expansion franchise to a contender, and actually finished seventh in MVP voting in 1985, just above his fellow Killer B, George Bell, who went on to win the MVP award two years later in 1987.

Barfield is remembered for having a cannon arm out of right field and great defensive prowess, as he is second all-time in the team’s defensive WAR (9.5). While Barfield sadly was never a part of any World Series runs in Toronto as he was traded to the New York Yankees in 1989, he was still at the helm of baseball in Canada.

Much like fellow Hall of Excellence members Cheek and Martinez, Barfield served as a colour commentator for games on CBC in 2007 and 2008. In 2023, he was inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame. Adding Barfield to the Hall of Excellence would be a great nod full circle to a team that is keen on celebrating the past as well as the future.

Jimmy Key was one of the Blue Jays’ first great pitchers. Drafted in the third round of the 1982 MLB draft, Key made his big league debut in 1984 as a reliever.

He was used as a starter for the rest of his career, making the All-Star game in 1985, finishing second in American League Cy Young voting in 1987 thanks to winning the ERA title, and earning a second nod to the All-Star Game in 1991. Key was a member of the first World Series winning team, earning the win in the decisive Game 6 after pitching the bottom of the 10th.

The Huntsville, Alabama product joined the New York Yankees for the 1993 season, earning his third All-Star nod. He’d do the same in 1994, and even make the team with the Baltimore Orioles in 1997, his penultimate season in the league.

Key is fourth in all-time wins for the Blue Jays, going 116-81 over his nine seasons with the organization.

Ranking fifth as the all-time Blue Jays win leader is Pat Hentgen. Drafted in 1986, Hentgen didn’t make his big league debut until 1991, appearing in three games. He got regular playing time in 1992, appearing in 28 games where he made two starts.

It was until the 1993 season when Hentgen joined the team’s rotation, posting a 3.87 ERA over 216.1 innings of work. While he didn’t pick up a win in the World Series clinching game like Key did, Hentgen started Game 3 and went six innings of one-run ball in an eventual Blue Jays’ victory.

His best days were after the back-to-back World Series, winning the American League Cy Young in 1996, and being named an All-Star in 1993, 1994, and 1997. His first Blue Jays’ stint ended after the 1999 season, but he re-joined the Blue Jays for the 2004 season, his final big league season.

Over 10 season, he had a 107-85 record with a 4.28 ERA and 1,636 innings. On top of sitting fifth in all-time Blue Jays’ wins, he’s also pitched the fifth-most innings.

No closer in the history of the Blue Jays’ organization has more saves than Tom Henke, and it isn’t particularly close. Joining the organization in 1985, Henke amassed 217 saves, nearly 100 more than Duane Ward, who ranks second on the leaderboard with 121 saves. Henke isn’t just one of the best relievers in Blue Jays’ history, his 311 career saves rank 26th all-time.

Over eight seasons with the Blue Jays, Henke appeared in 446 games, posting a 2.48 ERA and 644 strikeouts. A reliever has yet to be inducted into the Blue Jays’ Hall of Excellence, but Henke should be the first.