Hang with this thought for a moment, because it does have a parallel in Major League Baseball, I promise:
In the Showtime series "The Affair," the episodes follow an interesting format, where the first half presents events and conversations from the viewpoint of one character, and the second half from another.
Some lines are repeated in both halves, but they sound and feel very different when seen and heard from a different perspective. This structure allows the producers to demonstrate how two people can interpret the same words and situations in contradictory ways.
This lesson on the importance of perspective could be applied to what happened within the Blue Jays' front office 11 days ago, as new Toronto president Mark Shapiro stepped into his job and GM Alex Anthopoulos walked away.
Since then, many people who are friends with both men have said privately they cannot believe this didn't work out. Shapiro is well-liked and respected by his peers for his knowledge and humor, and Anthopoulos is highly regarded for his relentless work ethic and self-deprecating ways. This seems to have been a case of two people who, for whatever reason, initially talked past each other, causing the same words and events to be interpreted differently by each.
The way this played out was ugly, and it left the Canadian-born Anthopoulos out of the job he wanted and Shapiro in a precarious political position moving forward, swimming upstream against the public perception that he drove Anthopoulos out of the job just days after the Blue Jays, a late-season phenomenon, reached the postseason for the first time in 22 years.
If I worked with either Shapiro or Anthopoulos, this would be my advice: Before you move on, push the reset button. Start over, and talk again.
Because the best possible outcome for both men is for Anthopoulos to be the general manager of the Blue Jays.