‘Wild couple days’: Newfoundland singer starts GoFundMe to attend World Series game in Toronto

A 38-year-old singer from St. John’s, Newfoundland jokingly posted on Facebook this week that he wanted donations so he could attend the World Series in Toronto. He quickly found out that Jays fans are a generous bunch.

“Definitely a wild couple days for me,” David Whitty says.

“[I] kind of made a a joking post online […] jokingly asking 4,000 people to donate one dollar to me so I can come to the baseball game.”

While he slept, that post blew up.

“It started getting shared so much, when I woke up the next day people were like ‘you should actually go for this.'”

So, the singer started a GoFundMe page.

“I did it still jokingly thinking I’d raise $300-400 to donate to a local charity at home…it blew up in 24 hours and here I am,” he says.

And here he is, indeed. Whitty landed at Toronto Pearson Airport this morning, and will be going to Game 1 of the World Series tonight. He’ll be sitting on the first base side, a few rows up from field level.

“I’ve been chatting with a few people,” Whitty says.

“A nice person offered to put me up in a hotel for the night, and a nice guy in Oakville told me he’d take me to the game if I donated some money to a women’s shelter there.”

Whitty created the GoFundMe page three days ago, and it’s already raised close to $9,500. He intends to leave the page up through the weekend, but says there’s there’s been a lot of pressure and negativity on social media.

“A lot of people associate GoFundMe and crowdsourcing with people who have health issues, not necessarily getting a guy from Newfoundland to the ball game,” he says.

The Jays fan says he was too young to appreciate when the team last won the World Series 32 years ago, but thinks they have a fighting chance this year.

“There’s no doubt about it, the Dodgers are a juggernaut,” Whitty said.

“But the Jays have a chance. [They’ve] been the comeback kids the whole time.”

Whitty says a big portion of the money will go to a children’s sports organization in Newfoundland, and a few charities in Ontario.

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