Latest news with #Jays
Hamilton Spectator
9 hours ago
- Sport
- Hamilton Spectator
Why waiting for Anthony Santander hasn't been a losing game for the Blue Jays
The Blue Jays ' biggest free-agent signing of the winter has been absent throughout almost their entire climb to first place, and it doesn't look as though he's going to be back any time soon. Anthony Santander — signed to a five-year, $92.5-million (U.S.) contract in January to provide power in the middle of the order — is back in Toronto and had his wonky shoulder examined by team doctors on the weekend. The verdict: Let's wait awhile. 'He's still going to be a couple of weeks away from hitting,' manager John Schneider said before the Jays opened a three-game series against the New York Yankees with a 4-1 win Monday night . '(We'll) evaluate him week by week to see when that does start.' In other words, it's going to be a long time before the Jays get the switch-hitter back. Though, to be fair, they haven't missed him at all. Quite the opposite, in fact. Santander suffered a subluxation of his left shoulder when he went into the wall in Anaheim, chasing a Jo Adell fly ball in an 8-5 win over the Los Angeles Angels on May 8 . He missed three games, watching the Jays sweep the Seattle Mariners, then returned to go 5-for-41 with one home run and 19 strikeouts before shutting it down on May 29. With the 30-year-old slugger on the injured list, the Jays have gone 31-13, the best record in the American League . Still, the Jays say they can't wait to get him back. 'We want to have the option of having him, obviously. It's just worked out to where it hasn't been as quick as we, or he, had hoped' said Schneider. 'You feel good about the contributions of guys that have been here, but a player like him and what he can add, you don't want to slow-play it. You want to try to get it fixed as quickly as you can.' Before Santander got hurt, he was hitting just .196 with five home runs in 36 games . He was starting to come around, though , with multi-hit games in three of his last five, posting an .875 on-base-plus-slugging percentage over that span. The shoulder injury dulled whatever momentum was starting to build for a player who is a notorious slow starter . Trying to play through the injury didn't help, either. And as Santander continued to struggle while playing hurt, he tried to do more physically — more work in the batting cage, more out on the field to try to snap out of it — and that likely made things a lot worse. Coming off a career-high 44 home runs in 2024 with the Baltimore Orioles, Santander was supposed to be the power bat the Jays had been sorely lacking pretty much since Teoscar Hernández was traded away following the 2022 season . He only hit four home runs in April, but didn't hit his fifth home run last year until May 5, so it didn't seem like that big a deal. As the weather heats up, so does the big slugger, but this year he never got the chance. Addison Barger did, though . When Santander hurt his shoulder, Barger was hitting .171 and scuffling for playing time , starting about every other day. The injury opened the door to more playing time and young Bam-Bam barged right through it by going 6-for-13 with three doubles and a home run in the Seattle sweep. Since then, the 25-year-old has belted 13 dingers and posted an .878 OPS, providing everything the Jays had hoped Santander would with the bat and doing much more defensively, in right field and at third base. In addition, Barger's emergence has allowed George Springer to spend a lot of time off his feet . Springer started at designated hitter 16 times before Santander went on the injured list, or 31 per cent of his games. Since Santander has gone down, Springer has been the DH two-thirds of the time (27 of 41 games). No doubt that has kept the 35-year-old fresh in this resurgent season in which he leads the Jays with 17 home runs. The Jays aren't saying Santander is done for the year, though he hasn't swung a bat in over a month and there's still inflammation in his shoulder. If he can get healthy, he could help down the stretch, but they've been more than fine without him.
Edmonton Journal
15 hours ago
- Sport
- Edmonton Journal
The 'Who Jays' are in first place. How is this happening?
Article content Fluharty. Lauer. Little. Sandlin. Article content Wagner. Straw. Nance. Lukes. Article content Clement. Jimenez. Schultz. Schneider. Fisher. Article content If you can't match a first name to a last, that's understandable. Most of baseball couldn't. This is the most unique, the invisible, unexpected team in Blue Jays history. Article content Article content And we can't take our eyes off them. Article content Article content They won't let us as they remain in first place in the American League East, now four games up on the Yankees, with a better record than the huge spenders in New York, Los Angeles and Philadelphia. Article content They won't let us turn away. These are your first-place Blue Jays, winners of 11 in a row at home. Yep, that's 11 in a row. Article content Those World Series champions of 1992 and 1993 never won 11 in a row at home in Toronto. The great 1985 Jays, who probably should have won a World Series in an awful stadium, never got to 11. Same with those electric teams of 2015 and 2016, at least one of which should have been fitted for rings and didn't quite get there. Article content There were not a lot of Nathan Lukeses on those teams, or Addison Bargers or Will Wagners or Joey Loperfidos. And you can keep adding on to those names. The great Blue Jays teams in history had MVP candidates such as Jesse Barfield and George Bell in 1985 — the AL MVP that year was won by current Blue Jays coach Don Mattingly — like Joe Carter and Roberto Alomar and Dave Winfield in 1992 and John Olerud and Carter and Paul Molitor in 1993. Great players doing great things. Article content Article content Josh Donaldson won the MVP in 2015 when baseball returned to life in the city and finished fourth the following year — with Jose Bautista hitting 40 home runs in 2015 and Edwin Encarnacion hitting 42 homers in 2016. Article content That's the history of winning teams in the sport. The best players, the biggest boppers, the deepest bullpens win. There aren't 15 or 16 of who-are-these-people? on most winning teams. Article content Mrs. Nathan Lukes, who has followed her husband city to city, league to league, and knows the letters DFA well, noticed the other day that the Jays starting lineup against the San Francisco Giants had two players on Major League contracts and everybody else in the starting nine were hoping there is a next year on any of their deals. Article content 'That's the beauty of this team,' said Lukes, who hits wherever the Jays put him the lineup and plays whatever position he is asked to play. This is his 10th season of professional baseball and the Blue Jays are his ninth team.
Edmonton Journal
15 hours ago
- Sport
- Edmonton Journal
Bichette leads way as Blue Jays drop Yanks for record 11th consecutive home win
Article content Until a little less than three weeks ago, Bo Bichette had never played on a first-place team this late in a big-league season, though he had thought about it often enough. Article content As the Blue Jays continue to cement their position atop the American League East, the shortstop rather likes the feeling. Article content 'It feels like it's something we've been striving to do,' Bichette said before playing the hero in a 4-1 Jays win over the New York Yankees at a rocking, sold-out Rogers Centre on Monday, the latest magical night in a summer piling up with them. Article content Article content 'It's the first time in my career. It feels good coming to the park every day with a bunch of teammates that are willing to do whatever it takes to win. When you do that, the best version of yourself will come out.' Article content It came out again in the opener of a three-game series, on a night when the schedule told you it was Game 100 for both the Jays and the Yankees, but it felt as though it was much more than a beautiful Monday evening in July. Article content 🗣️ LET'S BO 🗣️ — Toronto Blue Jays (@BlueJays) July 22, 2025 Article content Article content It was a brilliant summer night under an open roof at the downtown dome, a showdown between the top two teams in the division played before a sellout crowd of 41,788, the type of throng that is becoming commonplace for the most exciting Jays team in a decade. Article content Article content It was a battle early for the Jays on their way to a franchise-record 11th consecutive home win, but the will to win that is becoming the hallmark of this Toronto team took over in the decisive fifth inning. Article content The big blow of the four-run inning was a two-run double from Bichette to give the Jays their first runs and first lead of the night. Article content The 27-year-old sensed the importance of the moment as well as he ripped a double into the left-field corner off of Yankees southpaw Carlos Rodon and celebrated animatedly as he reached second and watched first George Springer and then Vlad Guerrero Jr. scamper across home plate.
Edmonton Journal
19 hours ago
- Sport
- Edmonton Journal
Is Anthony Santander's first season as a Blue Jay teetering on the edge?
It's difficult to be both the forgotten man and the $92.5-million man brought in to provide explosive offence. Article content But that's where the Blue Jays find themselves with Anthony Santander, the slugger they signed to a free agent contract in January, and now a veteran whose season is teetering on being a lost one. Article content Article content Jays manager John Schneider provided an update on the injured designated hitter/outfielder on Monday prior to the opening game of a three-game series against the New York Yankees. And as you might expect given Santander's long and frustrating absence from the team, it wasn't pretty. Article content Article content 'He's still a couple of weeks away from hitting and we'll kind of evaluate him week to week to see when that does start,' Schneider said of Santander, who has rejoined the team in Toronto for more medical attention during this home stand, which began with a three-game sweep of the San Francisco Giants over the weekend. Article content Article content Schneider didn't need to say much more than that, truthfully. If the personable Santander is still a couple of weeks away from hitting, then he's a couple of weeks away from being ready to play and then another week, potentially, of rehab games before he could even be considered ready to play in a big-league game. Article content In other words, the math doesn't look good. Article content And then there's the issue of how you deal with Santander when (if?) he is ready? Prior to Monday's game, the 30-year-old had been on the injured list for 43 games with what the team lists as shoulder inflammation. Article content Article content During his absence, of course, the Jays have been on fire, running off a 30-13 record and storming into first place in the American League East. So where exactly would he fit in the lineup given that prior to the injury, Santander was struggling at the plate, initially excused by the fact he has been a notoriously slow starter in his career. Article content Article content 'He's disappointed,' Schneider said. 'It's bad timing, first year here and all that kind of stuff. He's frustrated, but happy with the way we are playing and (we're) happy to have him back around.' Article content For the longest time, the Jays were vexed with what was happening with Santander, a situation that continues on some level. Schneider said on Monday that he believes the guy who banged out 42 home runs for the Baltimore Orioles last season may have been compromised by trying to play through an injury originally sustained when he crashed hard into an outfield wall in Anaheim.
Edmonton Journal
a day ago
- Sport
- Edmonton Journal
Forget AL East crown, Blue Jays taking aim at top of AL or MLB
Article content And here's where what happens off of the field over the next 10 days matters in a large way. With a fired-up fan base, a united clubhouse and a team that seems to be relishing the intangibles of what a winning team feels like, it's on general manager Ross Atkins to enhance what's happening in a meaningful way. Article content As obvious as the comparisons to 2015 are, it's impossible not to draw parallels to a decade ago. The players feel it. The fans feel it. And a renovated Rogers Centre feels like the place to be in the peak of a Toronto summer. Article content Which brings us back to the present. The week ahead certainly serves up a stout test on a couple of fronts for the Jays. First, you can bet the Yankees won't roll over like they did earlier in the month when they were swept away in the four-game series that allowed the Jays to surge to the division lead. Article content Article content Following that, there's a four-gamer at the other end of the 401 when the Jays meet the Tigers in perhaps the most important showdown against their closest geographical rival in decades. Over the seven games, the Jays will face the Yankees top two starters — Rodon on Monday and Max Fried on Wednesday. And in the Motor City, they'll take on ace of aces, the Tigers Tarik Skubal on the weekend. Article content Article content As for the Yankees, when they previously arrived in Toronto on June 30, they held a three-game lead over the Jays before the four losses — including a resounding Canada Day celebration — caused them to surrender top spot. Article content Since then, the Jays have been on an historic run in terms of franchise accomplishments. There was a 10-game winning streak, matching the club mark. There have been the 10 consecutive wins at the dome, equalling another franchise record and what a way to eclipse it with a fifth consecutive Toronto win over their division rival. Article content The Jays are well aware of what's at stake — it's impossible not to be. They can read and digest the standings like you and I, they can feel the energy at the Rogers Centre, which is full or close to it every day and night now. Article content Presumably, they're also well aware of what got them to this place (on pace for 95 wins) and that's a laser focus on the immediate task and to quickly flush the big win or loss the previous night.
