Columnist image

| Archive

BRONX, N.Y. — The reports on Jordan Romano as he was coming up through the Toronto Blue Jays farm system were all the same.

Lively fastball, really good breaking ball, but his stuff waned the longer the outing went and he could never quite develop his changeup enough to give him a viable third pitch.

Everything was pointing towards a future in the bullpen, and it’s even something Romano himself quietly preferred after he spent his lone season at Oral Roberts University closing out games in 2014.

“Honestly, I wanted to be in the ‘pen for the last couple of years I was in the minor leagues,” Romano recalled Tuesday afternoon inside the Blue Jays clubhouse at Yankee Stadium. “I liked starting and stuff, but I was a closer in college and I kind of just liked it a bit better. I kind of just wanted to be in the ‘pen because I thought that’s what suited me best.”

There were many in the organization who agreed, but Romano spent the 2016, 2017 and 2018 seasons working his way up the ladder in the rotation, starting 66 games across those three campaigns and reaching Triple-A.

“I remember him kind of being inconsistent as a starter, but the talk about him was always about his power, his fastball, and his plus breaking ball,” Jays pitching coach Pete Walker said. “We always knew he had those two effective pitches but, I think, the organization was really trying hard to keep him in a starter role and working on that changeup was a focal point for such a long time.

“It came to the point where it just really wasn’t working.”

Romano still pitched well enough that the Texas Rangers decided to take a chance on the right-hander in the Rule 5 draft in December of 2018, but he couldn’t claim the long-man bullpen job he was competing for and was eventually returned to the Jays organization at the end of spring training in 2019.

“It kind of felt like a six-week vacation and then I was back with the boys,” Romano said with a smile.

“I think everything happens for a reason. I really wanted to make the team in Texas, but when I got sent back it just felt right. I kind of wouldn’t want it any other way.”

These days, that looks like a huge mistake for the Rangers, and some good luck for the Blue Jays, as Romano has blossomed in the three years since, setting a new franchise record for consecutive saves Monday at Yankee Stadium when he converted his 26th-straight opportunity to close out a game to erase Tom Henke’s old mark of 25 from 1991.

Born in 1993, Romano doesn’t remember much about Henke.

“I know he was called the Terminator, which is an awesome nickname,” Romano grinned. “Honestly, I didn’t watch him much growing up. Talking to my parents and stuff, he was a big time guy and a lot of people’s favourite closer. It’s kind of cool to be mentioned with him.”

Romano remembers the day he was told by former Triple-A pitching coach Doug Mathis — currently the Rangers’ big-league co-pitching coach — that he was moving to the bullpen like it was yesterday.

“I think I had a 14.00 ERA at the time as a starter so they’re like, ‘Hey, let’s move you to the bullpen,’ but I was happy about it even though it was kind of a demotion,” Romano said. “It was a promotion for me.”

He didn’t become a dominant, short-burst reliever overnight.

In Double-A in 2018 as a starter, Romano’s fastball was averaging around 91-92 mph.

While with the Rangers in the spring of 2019, that had ticked up into the 93-95-mph range.

But by summer of 2021, after two full years as a reliever, Romano was regularly touching triple digits and averaging 97.6 mph with his heater.

“Sometimes when you turn them loose for an inning or two, their mindset changes, their energy level changes, their aggressiveness changes,” Walker said. “He’s always had a strong arm. He might have been low-90s, but there were times when he showed more than that, so I think anytime you see that on occasion, you know it’s in there and it’s untapped.”

To begin 2022, Romano’s velocity has actually been down a bit, more regularly in the 95-97 mph range, rather than high-90s.

Despite being a perfect three-for-three in save chances, Romano hasn’t quite felt like he has it all working yet.

“I think that’s just something that’ll come,” he said of the velocity. “It was a bit of a weird off-season with the knee (surgery), I think I’ve just gotta get in the groove a little bit. My mechanics, timing, stuff like that, it hasn’t felt quite right yet. It’s getting there, but it’s not 100 per cent how I felt last year.

“I’m hoping it’ll just tick up naturally as the season goes on.”

Walker has noticed it, too, but he’s been impressed by how it hasn’t fazed Romano one bit.

“I think there’s still a lot of pitchers across baseball that aren’t quite where they want to be yet when it comes to a consistent level of velocity and feel for their pitches, but he’s keeping the same mindset no matter what his stuff is that night, whether it’s 96 or 99, he’s going to come at you with his good fastball and he’s going to locate it and be able to spin his breaking ball off that and he’s still very difficult to hit,” Walker said.

After staking claim to the ninth inning over the final two months of last season, no one questions what Romano’s role is these days, even if the title of “closer” isn’t thrown around much by manager Charlie Montoyo.

But not only has Romano proven his high-octane stuff works in the ninth inning, he’s also shown the organization that he has the right mentality for the job.
In an era of analytics that has produced a relatively new line of thinking that a team’s best reliever should be used when the outs matter the most and that isn’t necessarily in the ninth inning, there’s still a certain degree of pressure when it comes to getting the final three outs of a ballgame.

Matt Buschmann, the Jays’ director of pitching development and bullpen coach, sees that closer demeanour with Romano.

“Just talking to him every day in the bullpen and hearing how his mind works and just how thoughtful he is about his mental performance and how he handles the day-to-day pressures of being a closer, I think hearing him talk like that made me say, ‘I don’t think I have to worry about the mental side with him,’” Buschmann said. “To me, that’s the hardest part of being a closer. You’ve got to have the stuff, and he has that, but, I think, it was the mental part to do it daily and have expectations and be able to anchor that that sealed it for me.

“It’s one thing to be a very good reliever, but there’s something about getting the last three outs, especially on the road, that takes a certain ability. We can’t quantify it, but there’s something about the last three outs.”

Walker agrees.

“I think he fell in love with the role and it suits his personality,” Walker said. “He’s a hammer at the end of a game. He’s selfless and he’s a great teammate and he’ll do whatever it takes to win a ballgame. I remember having conversations with him about that and all he wants to do is win and his mindset carries over to the other pitchers. He’s been a great leader in that bullpen and I think guys love the way he goes about his business.”

With a fancy new walk-in intro at Rogers Centre and his name being mentioned in the same breath as Henke, the Markham, Ont., product is embracing the pressure.

“When I got to the ‘pen, I wanted to be the guy closing out games,” Romano said. “It does come with a little more stress and responsibility because if you have a bad day that could be the ballgame. If I’m out there, I know I have to be on my ‘A’ game every day or else it’s probably not going to be a good night for us.”