The Blue Jays have been playing with fire for well over a year considering the lack of depth in their starting rotation, and they might finally be about to get burnt.
Alek Manoah‘s right elbow injury has left them exposed.
After an MRI on Thursday, the 26-year-old pitcher is scheduled for an in-person visit with Dr. Keith Meister early next week. For now, Manoah has been diagnosed with a sprained ulnar collateral ligament. If surgery isn’t required, he would likely miss six to eight weeks before a rehab assignment. That would rule him out until after the July 30 trade deadline.
“When you look at other cases around the league, he’s going to miss some time,” Jays manager John Schneider said of Manoah, who was placed on the 15-day injured list prior to Friday night’s game against the Pittsburgh Pirates at the Rogers Centre. “Exactly how long, not sure, but I think getting in person with a renowned doctor will shed a little bit more light on that.”
A lengthy setback to a starting pitcher would normally lead to a next-man-up situation. One man’s departure is another man’s opportunity and every season is littered with examples of lesser players trying to fill the void.
That’s not the case with the Jays because they don’t have any backup starters, at least not in the traditional sense. There isn’t a pitcher in the entire organization capable of filling in on a full-time basis, which means Schneider will be forced to try patchwork solutions.
Right-hander Bowden Francis is the leading candidate to take Manoah’s spot. The third-year hurler hasn’t pitched in the majors since he went down with a forearm injury on April 24, but made four rehab appearances in the minors and has already rejoined his teammates in Toronto. He’s ready.
That helps, but the 28-year-old Francis isn’t a starter. He moonlighted as one earlier this season and the experiment failed. After allowing 12 runs across two outings, it was determined that Francis would be limited to long relief, with the belief that he’s more effective in shorter stints.
The only thing that has changed is that Francis got hurt and then Manoah did, too, which forced the club’s hand. It seems likely that Francis will be limited to four innings or fewer, which means the Jays will require another pitcher to piggyback behind him.
That pairing might eventually include Yariel RodrÃguez, who like Francis has been working his way back from injury. RodrÃguez impressed in four starts for the Jays earlier this year, but didn’t register more than four innings in any of them and still broke down within two weeks.
The third option is Trevor Richards. The versatile reliever has thrown upwards of 3 1/3 innings in a game this season, but no more than 38 pitches.
Combined, all three could help the Jays get through nine innings on a day when Manoah would have pitched, and yet it wouldn’t leave Schneider with much flexibility for the rest of the ‘pen. The strategy might work for a bit, but it won’t get the Jays through the next two-plus months.
One direction they won’t take — at least not very often — is using off-days to skip Manoah’s turn entirely. They tried that last year in addition to mixing in Richards as a spot starter, and while it worked for almost a month, the toll that took on a veteran staff became evident as the season wore on.
“It’s tough; we did that last year,” said Schneider, who also doesn’t have top pitching prospect Ricky Tiedemann available — out since April 26 with a similar elbow injury. “You want to keep everyone as available as you can. Right now, we’re just focused on the next turn through and going from there.”
What’s clear is that the front office didn’t learn any lessons from last season. The Jays were extremely fortunate to get through the year without any of their top four starters getting hurt. The fifth spot was pieced together with Manoah, veteran Hyun-Jin Ryu and Richards.
One serious setback to Kevin Gausman, Chris Bassitt, José BerrÃos or Yusei Kikuchi would have pushed the Jays out of the playoff race entirely. They got away with it, and then — despite having an entire off-season to build up depth — chose to risk it all again this season with a similar strategy.
The general rule is that MLB teams require eight to 10 starters to get through a season. For the better part of two years, the Jays have never had more than six. This season, they had five.
That hasn’t cost them much of anything yet. However, with Manoah expected to miss at least the next two months and no viable candidates to replace him full time, that might be about to change.
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