Years ago, Ken Pagan was a dedicated journalist in the small city of North Bay, a local sports reporter who went out of his way to thoroughly cover everything from high school hockey games to high school volleyball.

When he moved to Hamilton to work at Postmedia after nearly a decade in North Bay, it was “a massive loss to the sports community,” said friend Sean Madigan.

His friends never imagined Pagan would have gone from a beloved sports reporter and fan to Public Enemy No. 1 overnight for allegedly tossing a beer can at the Blue Jays-Orioles wildcard game on Tuesday.

Just before the game, the anticipation was building as the packed crowd awaited the opening pitch.

Pagan, who wrote a personal blog about the Blue Jays, had tweeted a photo of the giant Canadian flag draped over the Rogers Centre field.

“Pretty big game tonight,” he wrote. “I’ll let Gibby know when Stroman is tired.”

About 24 hours later, police would release a photo of Pagan on Twitter, asking users to please retweet the image of the man wanted for a beer can-tossing incident that caught the attention across North America.

And with that, Pagan became infamous, perhaps Toronto’s version of notorious Cubs fan Steve Bartman.

Conspiracy theories surfaced as online sleuths dissected the video. Who had thrown the can?

By Thursday, Pagan surrendered to Toronto police and was charged with one count of mischief.

Since the moment Pagan’s photo first surfaced in connection with the incident, support has flooded in from the community where he once was given the Friend of Sport Award by the North Bay Sports Hall of Fame.

One shop in the city even started a campaign to help.

Paul McLean, the owner of Skater’s Edge Source for Sports, felt compelled to show his support after seeing the outpouring of outrage against his friend.

McLean, who played hockey in a men’s league of which Pagan was the commissioner, started selling #FREEPAGZ T-shirts for $10 on Thursday, with proceeds going toward paying Pagan’s legal fees. As of Friday morning, McLean had sold dozens of shirts in North Bay, and is shipping several more to Toronto, Oakville, Ottawa, and as far as Manitoba and Alberta.

“We put out these shirts because it felt like all of North America was looking for this guy, and we were some people that knew another side of the story,” McLean said. “We wanted to have his back.”

Pagan went above and beyond his duties as a sports reporter, McLean said.

“Instead of seeing one or two pictures with an article about a hockey game, he would post a 40-picture gallery,” McLean said. “He took the time to make sure not just one or two kids got their picture in the paper but the whole team. Knowing how much time he gave, and how much he cares about sports, I just think that someone is innocent until proven guilty.”

Madigan, who also played hockey with Pagan, said “he knew everybody and everybody knew him, he was so in-tune with our sporting community.

“He’s a loved guy.”

McLean is still in shock how things have spiraled.

“You’re sitting there saying, ‘No. It can’t be him. He wouldn’t do that. It’s got to be someone else’,” McLean said. “It’s like watching the Zapruder film of the JFK assassination. Everyone has a theory, people are critiquing other videos, it’s become an obsession for people. It’s crazy.”

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If Pagan is found to be the person responsible for the beer can incident, McLean said all proceeds will be donated to the North Bay Baseball Association.

Toronto criminal defence lawyer Ari Goldkind said he’s never seen a mischief charge attract this much attention.

“Whomever did this did bring disrepute on to 50,000 people in a stadium, did bring disrepute on to the good people of Toronto, and . . . threaten, in my view, the safety of ballplayers,” said Goldkind, who isn’t associated with the case. “But at the end of the day, we probably have a drunk idiot who made a nano-second mistake. I’m sorry, this is not Paul Bernardo.

“If I was Larry David, I’d say, ‘Can we please curb our enthusiasm here?’”

Goldkind said most mischief charges are associated with offences like “urinating on someone’s lawn or . . . keying your ex-boyfriend’s car.”

The maximum penalty for mischief is two years in jail; however, offenders are often handed fines, which would appear on a criminal record, or ordered to do community service.

But, in this case, there’ll be consequences outside the legal system too.

“The person responsible (for throwing the beer can) is not welcome back at Rogers Centre,” Blue Jays spokesperson Sebastian Gatica wrote in an email Friday.

Gatica would not comment on whether the person would receive a lifetime ban, and that “regarding security and alcohol policies … (we) are still discussing our options internally.”

Being banned from a Toronto sports venue isn’t unprecedented — a man was banned from all Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment events for at least a year in 2015 after shouting a vulgar phrase at a female television reporter following a Toronto FC match.

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