The Toronto Blue Jays pitching staff started spring training this year down at least one predictable starter, at least in my opinion.
They’ve lost key starter Nate Pearson to a right groin strain after he re-aggravated an injury that was first diagnosed following his spring training debut on March 1 during a bullpen session on Tuesday.
The injury to their top prospect spotlights how thin Toronto’s rotation is and how important a healthy and productive Pearson is to the Jays’ season, which opens in New York against the Yankees in less than two weeks.
Then on Wednesday, Thomas Hatch left his start in Dunedin, Fla., with elbow pain, further highlighting the issue.
The Jays’ front office rightfully promotes their depth in numbers in potential starting pitchers, but the reality is that the options they have are unproven at the major-league level.
The old baseball axiom that “you can never have enough pitching” holds true for the Jays, who are already being reminded of this before the 2021 season has even started.
There is a silver lining when it comes to Pearson, however. The 24-year-old was not going to be able to handle making 30 starts this season anyway. The Jays were going to have to manage his innings and workload to protect his arm from overuse.
He has only logged 163.2 innings during his four seasons in professional baseball. He threw only 20 of those innings in 2020 after missing five weeks with a right flexor strain during the COVID-19 pandemic-shortened season.
As a practice, teams rarely like to increase a pitcher’s innings from year-to-year by more than 20 per cent. The Jays have a bit more flexibility than the 20 per cent increase in Pearson’s case because of the reduced number of innings he tossed last season.
At any rate, it is unlikely that the Jays would push him much beyond 120 innings this season and that will still be reachable even with his delayed start to the season. They were going to have to back him off at some point anyhow. His injury is making the decision for them.
Pearson should be able to fully recover and get back to pitching, but the Jays will be conservative with his return as they want to make sure that his injury is fully healed.
The legs are the foundation of the pitching delivery and any attempt to compensate for an injury could cause different pressures on his elbow and shoulder. They don’t want his leg problem to become an arm problem.
Vladdy on the right track
Vladimir Guerrero Jr. is swinging the bat very well this spring.
Analysts around the game expect this to be the year that the young slugger finally breaks out. It doesn’t really matter what the experts think, it really only matters what Vlad Jr. believes. He arrived at spring training in better shape and is focused for a big season.
Guerrero hasn’t been bad by any means. But he taught us to expect big things based upon his domination in the minor leagues (.331/.414/.531). He just hasn’t been the same hitter in the major leagues – at least not yet.
I really believe he lost a bit of confidence and the way it shows itself is in his plate discipline and his reduced launch angle (it dropped from about 11 degrees in the minors to 4.6 degrees in 2020).
When a hitter lacks confidence, he finds himself in between pitches. Bad thoughts equal bad timing. The batter is behind the fastball and in front of the off-speed pitches. It is where the mental part of the game affects the physical part of the game. This leads to more ground balls. This is where Vlad Jr. has found himself.
In the minor leagues, Guerrero walked more than he struck out (151 BB/139 SO). In the major leagues, he has only walked 66 times and struck out 129 times. I watched Guerrero hunt for fastballs in the minor leagues. I watched him set up a pitcher to get a certain pitch in a certain count and take advantage of it. He controlled the at-bats. So far in the major leagues, the pitchers have often manipulated him.
We will know that Vladimir Guerrero Jr. has figured it out when his walks and strikeouts even out. That will mean that he is seeing the ball and trusting his timing at the plate. He will swing at more strikes and find himself in more hitter’s counts (1-0, 2-0, 2-1, 3-1) where the next pitch is more predictable. That is when his contact-to-damage ratio will increase. So far this spring, he has walked more than he has struck out. That is a great sign of things to come.