One had no problem openly rooting for it.
The other took the guarded, political approach.
Both president Mark Shapiro and general manager Ross Atkins are focused on their current employer, the Toronto Blue Jays, but there’s no doubt the other American League Division Series has been getting more than its fair share of attention from the Jays’ decision-makers.
Before they were Blue Jays, Shapiro and Atkins were Cleveland Indians, and it wasn’t just a brief stop on what can, oftentimes, be a winding major league map, either.
Shapiro called Ohio home since starting in the Indians’ player development department in 1991, working his way up to general manager and, eventually, the team president role he left last year to come to Toronto.