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“He never wanted it to be about him,” said Rance Mulliniks, a teammate with the Jays for seven seasons. “He was just there to do the best he could and help the ball club win games. He had no interest in being the number one guy. He just went out there and did his job.”

And what a job he did. An original Jay who was selected in the 1976 expansion draft from the Texas Rangers, and made 13 starts in the club’s inaugural season as a 21-year-old, Clancy’s name is still all over the Jays record book.

He is in the top three in wins, losses, innings pitched, games started, complete games, shutouts, walks and strikeouts, sixth in ERA and ninth in games pitched. He and Stieb are the only starters in the top 10 in that last category.

“Clance was a terrific pitcher and a very good teammate,” Buck Martinez said via text from his home in Florida about the pitcher he caught for five seasons. “Took the ball and never ever thought about coming out of the game. A very quiet guy, didn’t say much and was never one to boast of his accomplishments.”

Clancy was, as they say, a horse. In his all-star season of 1982, the Chicago native led the major leagues by making 40 starts, a number that has only been matched once since by knuckleballer Charlie Hough in 1987. Clancy posted a career-high 266 2/3 innings (one of six seasons in which he threw at least 219) and a career-best 16 wins for the last-place ‘82 Jays.

That year, Clancy threw one of the greatest games ever pitched by a Blue Jay: perfect into the ninth inning against the Minnesota Twins at Exhibition Stadium on Sept. 28. Randy Bush broke it up with a soft single to right field over the head of a leaping Damaso Garcia at second base.

“He broke Randy’s bat completely,” recalls Mulliniks, who spoke to the Star by phone from his home in California. “Jim made a great pitch and it was just one of those unfortunate things. It just wasn’t meant to happen. I don’t think he showed a lot of emotion as I recall, but I know Buck (Martinez) was catching that night and I think Buck had tears in his eyes.”

Martinez confirmed that version of events: “I really wanted Clance to get the perfect game.”

Outfielder Lloyd Moseby was just 20 when he arrived in ÎÚÑ»´«Ã½ in 1980. By then Clancy was the veteran leader of the pitching staff, with Stieb having not yet established himself as a perennial all-star.

“We looked to Clancy at that time,” Moseby said over the phone from his California home. “He was a great teammate, I think that’s the best compliment you can give to somebody. You can talk to anybody — 99 more guys — and they’re going to say the same thing: great teammate, great person.”

Iconic closer Tom Henke echoed that sentiment.

”(Clancy) was the kind of veteran that young guys want to encounter,” Henke said from his farm in Missouri, having just finished a Saturday morning of canning tomatoes. “He was very supportive, very encouraging, always there to give you a hand. If you needed any advice, you could go to him. He was a great, great teammate.”

And as that innings total shows, Clancy prided himself on trying to finish what he started.

“He would always find a way to settle down and pitch deep into the game,” said Mulliniks. “I recall one time he got knocked around early in a game and (manager) Bobby Cox went to the mound. I remember Bobby asking him how he felt and he said, ‘I feel fine, my location is just off a little bit. I’ll settle down and I’ll get us into the seventh.’ And sure enough, that’s what he did.”

That bulldog mentality was reflected in the fact that although Clancy notched 42 wins while the Jays had Henke as closer, the Terminator only saved six of them.

“He was that old-time starter where by golly he started it, he wanted to finish it,” said Henke. “But in saying that, he still had the ultimate respect for guys who came in behind him. He was a team player, but you were going to have to drag him out, fight tooth and nail to get him out of a game.”

Clancy was the second-last of the original Jays to leave, as a free agent after the 1988 season; catcher Ernie Whitt stuck around through 1989.

He stood six-foot-four, but was a gentle giant — soft-spoken with a big laugh.

“I can hear that laugh right now,” said Moseby. “Just a beautiful man.”

Clancy leaves wife Dawn, five children from his first marriage and 13 grandchildren. A celebration of life will be held in Chicago on Aug. 23.

“We lost a good one,” said Henke. “He’ll be missed, but he won’t be forgotten.”