#it is arbitrary. all of these categories are arbitrary. i hope nobody takes them seriously

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Jordan Romano of the Toronto Blue Jays (2021) bluejaysnation.com

All Arms on Deck

We are now less than 10 days away from Opening Day and there are major questions still remaining in regards to what the Toronto Blue Jays pitching staff will look like. Those range from the composition/order of the starting rotation to who will be the closer. This is not ideal for a team hoping to surprise many in the ultra competitive AL East. It’s not really ideal for any team at this juncture. Spring training is supposed to be a time for new and old teammates to get acquainted while the coaching staff makes the tough decisions on who will make up the roster once the games begin to count. Sure, there could still be a position battle or two that are going down to the wire. Maybe even a decision on which pitcher will grab the 5th rotation spot or which will take a middle reliever slot. Unfortunately, those decisions can be made for a team if injures hit. The Toronto Blue Jays certainly haven’t been sparred from that as both the rotation and bullpen are in flux due to injury.

The rotation had a hole to fill almost right off the bat when promising young hurler, Nate Pearson, came up lame with a grade 1 groin strain early in camp on March 1st. There was some hope that he would heal quick enough to still have time to get ready to take the ball for game #2 of the regular season on April 3rd. Then he re-aggravated the injury on March 16th officially ending any chance of that. Realistically though, the Jays were always going to slow play it with Nate as a way to limit his innings right away. In a season where his innings and work load are going to be monitored closely anyways, the injury made the decision to delay his start an easy one. This could be of great benefit to a team with playoff aspirations as a way to ensure Pearson is available come that time. He only threw 18 innings in an arm injury plagued shortened season in 2020 and generally teams don’t like to push pitchers beyond a 100 inning increase from year to year. That puts him at around 120 innings for 2021. That doesn’t mean he can’t push that to between 130-140 innings, but given the injury history he has accrued already chances are that won’t be the case. MLB teams now have all the analytics and technology in place to monitor everything on a player from the amount of proper recovery sleep they get to even the slightest changes to a pitcher’s body movements when they throw. So, that innings scale can slide depending on many factors rather than simply relying on an arbitrary number (ie. 100 innings increase, 100 pitches per game limit, etc.). As the most promising and dominant right hander the Jays have in their system, Nate Pearson’s loss will not only be felt in the rotation’s effectiveness but in the composition.

With perennial All-Star and Cy Young candidate, lefty Hyun Jin Ryu, anchoring the starters on Opening Day, it was expected that Pearson would follow him before getting to the next 2 lefties in Robbie Ray and Steven Matz. That will not be the case now. Instead, it appears Toronto could go with 3 lefties in a row then have 2 righties. In the 5th spot will likely be Tanner Roark. The 4th spot will be Nate Pearson’s replacement. Ross Stripling looks to be the guy for that. Neither he nor Roark have been overly impressive this spring (Stripling with a 5.19 era in 8.2 innings and Roark with an 8.44 era in 10.2 innings), so expect a fair amount of bullpen work on the days they start. Fortunately, the 3 lefties have looked great in compiling era’s of 1.50, 1.98, and 0.90 for Ryu, Ray, and Matz respectively. Of note are the performances of Anthony Kay and T.J. Zeuch who have made the decisions of the back-end starters difficult. Kay has thrown 11 innings with 11 K’s and a 4.09 era while Zeuch has thrown 7 innings with 1 K and a sparkling 1.29 era. 2 very different kinds of pitchers, but mutually a tough call to have them available to step in from the alternate site as they await the start of the minor league season in May. I have no doubts we will be seeing them early on should Roark’s and Stripling’s spring troubles leak into the regular season. Maybe even one of them ends up in the bullpen, though the Jays will probably want to keep them stretched out.

Speaking of the bullpen, the worst possible scenario took place on March 22nd as the Jays announced that new closer Kirby Yates would be down for multiple weeks following a strain of the flexor-pronator in his right pitching arm. To say this is extremely troubling is an understatement. Coming to Toronto on a low risk 1 year/$5.5 million deal this offseason, there was, and still is, hope he would regain his form from his uber dominant 2019 season. That season he was an All Star while pitching to a 1.19 era with 101 K’s in 60.2 innings and racking up 41 saves! Last season was the complete opposite, as he only threw 4.1 innings with a hideous 12.46 era in a season ended early with an arm injury. He had subsequent surgery to remove bone chips though no other structural damage was found. Hopefully this new injury also falls into that category and with some rest and rehab he is back sooner than later. Until that time, Toronto must decide how they will nail down those tight 9th inning leads. Will a de facto closer emerge from an experienced group of Jordan Romano, Rafael Dolis, Ryan Borucki, David Phelps, Tyler Chatwood, and A.J. Cole? Will a dark horse emerge like Anthony Castro (12 K’s in 6.1 innings)? Or, will they choose to go with the committee approach? There certainly isn’t enough time left in the spring to determine who will close so expect a committee approach to start with the opportunity for someone to take the job and run with it. In Romano, the Jays think very highly of his stuff and make up with pitching coach Pete Walker calling him a “closer in the making.” Do not be surprised if he is given the first save chance. If he performs as he did last season, and like he has this spring, then there is little doubt he will be the interim closer. Though, if he faulters and the Jays have to start moving down the list then it could end up being anybody’s or perhaps nobody’s job until Yates returns. Even when Yates does return, it is likely he will be eased in which could leave save opportunities up for grabs for the first month and a half of the season at least.

There is no doubt that those are major issues heading into the season, but as you can see the Blue Jays have built up some depth to help solve them. There is also no doubt there will be even more injuries and roster juggling as the season progresses. The depth will be seriously tested if it’s not being already. Pitchers and players will emerge that none of us know anything about. There will be some wonderful stories with that. It’s all part in parcel with the long grind of the MLB season where the teams that weather those challenges the best are usually the ones battling it out come September.

*all stats from baseball reference.com

*supplementary info from MLB.com

By: Jaymee Kitchenham