Who’s Hot, Who’s Cold: Blue Jays Pitchers

Over the past four weeks the Blue Jays are 14-10. The pitchers have a 4.06 ERA, just slightly better than their 4.23 ERA on the season.

Hot

Max Scherzer: 5 starts, 4-1, 2.61 ERA. In 31 innings batters hit .209/.266/.400, 5 home runs, 8 walks and 22 strikeouts.

Four of Max’s five starts were Quality Starts. The other, he allowed one too many runs for it to be a Quality Start. He’s been terrific. More home runs than you would like, but then he hasn’t had many runners on base for those homers. I didn’t think

he would be this good at this age, but I’m happy to be wrong, and I hope it continues for another couple of months. I enjoy watching him pitch. He seems to have a plan every time out for every batter.

Chris Bassitt: 5 starts, 0-2, 3.67 ERA. In 27.0 innings, batters hit .214/.322/.378, 4 home runs, 14 walk and 27 strikeouts.

More of a ‘hot light’ than hot. One Quality Start in the five starts, but he came up short of six innings in the others. If the inning limit on quality starts were 5 innings, he’d have four quality starts. The game has changed; it used to be that someone going ‘just’ six innings was a disappointment. At one time, it was an insult to be a ‘seven-inning-pitcher’. But guys throw harder now; they don’t have a pitcher to pitch to one time through the order, or an eighth spot hitter who had no power, so they tend not to go as deep in games. But Chris threw 4.2, 5, 5.2, 5.2 and 6 innings in his starts. Even in his two losses, he pitched a good game. He didn’t allow more than three earned runs in any of the five starts.

Tommy Nance: 12 games, 1-0, 0.68. In 13.1 innings, batters hit .204/.259/.204 with 3 walks and 14 strikeouts.

There were 5 stolen bases while he was on the mound, which seems like a lot in 13 innings. He’s been excellent. He’s pitched in 17 games this season.

Seranthony Domínguez: 11 games, 5.19, 1-1, 5 holds. In 8.2 innings, batters hit .167/.366/.233 with 9 walks and 10 strikeouts.

His ERA is high, and he’s walking too many, but guys aren’t hitting against him and, if they do, they aren’t hitting the ball hard against him. He had two bad outings, and most of the runs scored after he left the game.

Cold

José Berríos: 4 starts, 2-1, 4.64 ERA. In 21.1 innings batters hit .274/.330/417 with 3 home runs, 5 walks and 18 strikeouts.

One of four starts was a Quality Start. His starts were 5.1, 5.1, 4.1 and 6.1 innings. He seems to be tiring. The team says they are going to skip his turn in the rotation. I think it is a good idea, but then Eric Lauer had a pretty terrible start after his break. It is a fine line, you want to give their arms a rest, but you don’t want them to lose their edge.

Eric Lauer: 4 starts, 5.30 ERA. In 18.2 innings batters hit .333/.393/.630 with 6 home runs, 8 walks and 16 strikeouts.

He had one quality start, one good start, two bad starts. Well, one bad start and then Wednesday’s start, for which bad isn’t a strong word. It might take a couple of starts for him to get back to where he was. I think giving him the time off was the right move, but then there was always the possibility that he would be a bit rusty. But then again, maybe it was just a bad start; he is allowed one.

Jeff Hoffman: 11 games, 2-1, 4 saves, 3 blown saves, one a blow save win, one a blown save loss, the other we came back to win. In 10. innings, batters hit .194/.356-.389 with 2 home runs, 8 walks and 13 strikeouts.

It has been an adventure. I was surprised that guys were hitting less than .200 against him this month, but then he’s walked too many. He’s pitched in a lot of games in the last three years, 54 in 2023, 68 last year and already 58 this year (which would have him pitching in 70 games this year, if it continues the same). That’s a throwback to the old days (Little has pitched in 62 games, Varland 61).

Yariel Rodríguez: 9 games, 0-1, 2 holds, 9.00 ERA. In 8 innings, batters hit ..310/.459.483, 1 home run, 7 walks and 6 strikeouts.

Yariel had been pretty consistent until this last month. John has been using him less and in lower-leverage spots (most of the time), he’s likely lower in the bullpen pecking order after the deadline pickups. Maybe has a tired arm?

Louis Varland: 11 games, 0-0, 4 holds, 1 blown save, 6.30 ERA. In 10 innings, batters hit .316/.378/.579 with 4 doubles, 2 home runs, 5 walks and 11 strikeouts.

He’s been hit hard since joining the Jays. He’s given up runs in 6 of the 11 games (I guess the good news is that he has given up just 1 run in five of those games, and 2 in the other). He’s also walked more batters than you would like.

Inbetween

Kevin Gausman: 5 starts, 1-3, 4.06 ERA. In 31 innings, batters hit .205/.244/.385 with 6 walks and 27 strikeouts.

In his five starts, two were Quality Starts, one was an inning short of being one and two were poor starts. He didn’t throw fewer than five innings in any of the starts. He gave up five home runs. All in all, not bad, not good. The batting line against is pretty good, but the ERA is a little worse than his season number. Not really cold, but kind of the late-season doldrums. Gausman is quite consistent, he’s thrown less than five innings just three times in his 26 starts.

Brendon Little: 12 games, 0-0, 6 holds, 1 save, 3.72 ERA. In 9.2 innings, batters hit .194/.366/.226 with 0 home runs, 8 walks and 8 strikeouts.

He also hit a batter and had 2 wild pitches. He faced 42 batters and walked 8 of them. That’s not good. But he’s not allowing many hits, or any home runs, just one extra base hit. I really thought his numbers would be much worse than they are. He give the catchers a workout. They run back to the backstop a lot when he is out there, and they have to work hard to block other pitches. He really should be buying them beer after each of his outings. So you want to be a manager? John has Hoffman, who’s been all sorts of terrible, Rodriguez who has been worse, and Little, who can’t find the strikezone with both hands and a compass and you have to navigate through close games.

Mason Fluharty: 10 games, 0-0, 1 save, 1 blown save, 5.63 ERA. Batters hit .179/.361/.429, with 2 home run, 8 walks and 5 strikeouts.

He really only had one bad outing, giving up four earned, with two home runs, while getting just two outs. Other than that, he was good. He is in the minors at the moment.

Braydon Fisher: 9 games, 0-0, 5.40 ERA. Batters hit .231/.344/.346 with 1 home run, 4 walks and 11 strikeouts.

He had a couple of bad outings, but was very good other than those two games. He’s in the minors too now. I liked him in that lower-leverage role, and he likely could have moved into a bigger one. I do wish John would have let him go more than an inning on occasion. That could have helped out the others in the pen.