Israel Fehr

    Israel Fehr is an editor for Yahoo Sports.

  • Year in Review 2016: Top Canadian sports stories

      The appetite for sports in Canada is never stronger than during an Olympic year, so it’s no surprise to see Olympians throughout our list of the top 10 Canadian sports stories of 2016. On top of all the successes of the country’s athletes in Rio, there were also eye-catching performances on the ice, court, and pitch that captured made it a most memorable year for Canadian sports fans.

  • Jonas Valanciunas' improvement is the key to Raptors' season

    "What to make of Jonas Valanciunas?" is still the No. 1 question for the Raptors entering a new season.

  • All-Canadian NBA rotation: Eight players to watch in 2016-17

    The 2016-17 NBA season begins Tuesday night and there are 11 Canadians on opening-night rosters.

  • Blue Jays' defeat in ALCS may signal end of an era in Toronto

    Jose Bautista ripped a ball to left field and the crowd at the Rogers Centre roared, reaching a crescendo as Bautista arrived at second base standing up to lead off the bottom of the ninth inning. This Toronto Blue Jays team that rose to prominence after years of mediocrity on the strength of a loaded lineup was finally going to break through and the player whose breakout gave the team its first building block years ago was getting the rally started. Josh Donaldson and Edwin Encarnacion struck out swinging and Troy Tulowitzki’s pop up was caught by first baseman Carlos Santana in foul territory for the final out of the inning, the game, and in Toronto’s case, the season.

  • Aaron Sanchez keeps Blue Jays in ALCS with great Game 4 start

    Aaron Sanchez stepped on the mound at Rogers Centre on Tuesday afternoon knowing full well he could be making his final start of the season. After pitching six innings of one-run ball as the Blue Jays beat Cleveland 5-1 in Game 5 of the ALCS, Sanchez made sure it wouldn’t be the final start of the year for his team. Down 0-3 in the series, Toronto needed the first win before they could start dreaming of an October comeback for the ages, and Sanchez delivered with one of his best performances of the season to spark the faith.

  • No time for Blue Jays to search for answers down 0-3 in ALCS

    The best the Blue Jays could come up with was that at least they have another game to play. Toronto lost Game 3 of the ALCS 4-2 on Monday night, going down 0-3 in the series, this latest loss the most frustrating of the three because of the circumstances of how the game played out. Cleveland’s starter Trevor Bauer had no choice but to leave the game in the first inning after recording just two outs as the blood gushing from the pinky he sliced servicing his drone would not relent.

  • History doesn't favour Blue Jays making ALCS comeback

    Monday night's ALCS Game 3 is as close to being a must-win for the Toronto Blue Jays as it can be without actually being a must-win.

  • Josh Donaldson doing his best to carry Blue Jays' stale offense

    Josh Donaldson stood by his locker and might as well have been asked how he had walked on water. The Toronto Blue Jays had just lost Game 2 of the ALCS 2-1 on Saturday at Progressive Field, but it was Donaldson who had the answer to the question everyone wanted to know. How did he possibly manage to work a hit off Cleveland reliever Andrew Miller?

  • Blue Jays bite tongues on ump as offense lacks bite in Game 1 loss

    The Blue Jays’ visible complaints about the strike zone Friday night at Progressive Field in Game 1 of the ALCS were not made vocal after the game in the clubhouse. There was definite frustration following a 2-0 loss to Cleveland, but the angst was directed internally, not externally, at least not publicly. “We’ll leave that up to you guys to talk about,” said Jose Bautista, who went 0-for-3 with three strikeouts, one of them called.

  • Blue Jays' Marco Estrada should stick to same approach in ALCS Game 1

    Marco Estrada set the bar high with his tremendous outing in the Blue Jays' Game 1 ALDS win. He'll be looking to replicate that performance, in results and approach, in Game 1 of the ALCS.

  • Blue Jays preparing for Cleveland's home field advantage in ALCS

    The Blue Jays will prepared to deal with the fall weather in Cleveland, but they’ll also have to contend with a hostile crowd.

  • ALCS preview: Indians vs. Blue Jays is a battle of different styles

    The Cleveland Indians and Toronto Blue Jays are proof that you can make a playoff run with vastly different kind of rosters. Offensively, that’s by design. What remains to be seen is what will make the difference when they match up in the American League Championship Series, beginning Friday in Cleveland. The Indians are a team that, for the most part, manufactures runs with sustained rallies.

  • Blue Jays, Indians enter ALCS with vastly different pitching situations

    Toronto has an edge in the rotation, but Cleveland's bullpen is deep and dynamic.

  • ALCS-bound Blue Jays ready to do what they couldn't last season

    These Toronto Blue Jays did not enter the postseason as the team to beat. Sure, their starting pitching was finally up to snuff, but their bullpen was thin and their play most of September was about as far from ready-to-do-this as you could get. Sunday night’s 7-6 walk-off win to sweep the Texas Rangers in the ALDS was Toronto’s sixth straight win: the two final regular season games – games they needed to clinch home field in the wild-card game – that wild-card game, also a walk-off, and the three games in the division series.

  • Russell Martin joins rare company with Game 3 ALDS home run

    TORONTO– When the Toronto Blue Jays signed Russell Martin as a free agent ahead of the 2015 season, they were well aware of his postseason pedigree. The Blue Jays have made the playoffs in Martin’s first two seasons with the team, and if anyone needed another reminder of Martin’s considerable experience in October – he’s been there nine times over 11 seasons with four teams, if you were wondering – he provided one in Game 3 of the ALDS on Sunday night. Martin’s first-inning home run off Texas Rangers starter Colby Lewis made him the fourth player in major-league history to hit a playoff home run for four different teams. Ron Gant, John Olerud and Reggie Sanders are the other three, according to ESPN Stats and Info.

  • Blue Jays won't sell beer cans at home games for rest of playoffs

    The Toronto Blue Jays announced Sunday morning ahead of Game 3 of the ALDS against the Texas Rangers that all beer sold inside Rogers Centre for the duration of the playoffs will be served in plastic cups, not in cans. The change in policy is the result of an ugly incident during the AL wild-card game Tuesday, when a fan threw a beer can toward Orioles left fielder Hyun Soo Kim as he prepared to make a catch. Toronto Police identified the culprit as Ken Pagan and he was charged with one count of mischief.

  • How Aaron Sanchez persevered for opportunity to send Jays to ALCS

    The most resistance Aaron Sanchez faced as a pitcher this season may have come from his own team, a testament to his brilliance on the mound and the constantly changing circumstances surrounding it. Sanchez, who will take the mound for the Toronto Blue Jays in Game 3 of the ALDS on Sunday night at Rogers Centre against the Texas Rangers, has been preparing for this moment since the second last season ended. This is what baseball players dream of, and Sanchez had worked too hard, buoyed by personal successes piling up start after start, that he had to speak up when it looked like it wasn’t going to happen at all.

  • Francisco Liriano taken to hospital after being hit by line-drive

    The Toronto Blue Jays are heading home with a 2-0 series lead over the Texas Rangers in the ALDS and are happy pitcher Francisco Liriano has been deemed healthy enough to join them after he was hit in the head by a line-drive by Carlos Gomez in the eighth inning of the Blue Jays’ 5-3 win Friday afternoon. Liriano was able to gather himself and walk off the field without any help, but an ambulance was outside the Blue Jays’ clubhouse after the game and a conscious Liriano was loaded into it on a stretcher with his neck mobilized, according to Sporsnet.ca’s Shi Davidi. The ball came off Gomez’s bat at 102 mph, connected with the side of Liriano’s head, and caromed into right-center field. The good news is that Liriano’s received the all-clear from doctors at a local hospital in Arlington to travel back to Toronto on the team flight.

  • ALDS Game 2: Blue Jays homer their way to win over Rangers

    Troy Tulowitzki’s two-run shot in the second inning was just the start of the Toronto Blue Jays’ home-run barrage as they beat the Texas Rangers 5-3 Friday afternoon at Globe Life Park to take a 2-0 series lead. Kevin Pillar, Ezequiel Carrera and Edwin Encarnacion also homered for the Blue Jays, all of the solo variety and all in the fifth inning, which was the final inning of the game for Rangers starter Yu Darvish. The Blue Jays left-hander gave up nine hits – all singles – and one run over five innings and struck out five.

  • ALDS Game 1: Blue Jays blast Cole Hamels, beat Rangers in Texas

    The Toronto Blue Jays’ bats came alive in Arlington, chasing Texas Rangers starter Cole Hamels in the fourth inning, to win Game 1 of the ALDS 10-1. The offensive onslaught began in the third, as the Blue Jays put up five runs, three of them coming from a bases-clearing triple by Troy Tulowitzki. Hamels returned in the fourth and promptly allowed a leadoff home run to Melvin Upton Jr. that made it 6-0 and Josh Donaldson’s RBI single three batters later ended Hamels’ outing early. The Rangers’ bullpen came in and kept the Blue Jays quiet until the ninth, when Jose Bautista blasted a three-run homer off Jake Diekman.