Sanchez smiling after tune-up
It was difficult to tell who was wearing the biggest smile before Sunday’s game at Tropicana Field — Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Aaron Sanchez or his manager John Gibbons.
Sanchez threw 33 pitches off the mound in a bullpen session and from the minute he stepped off it was obvious that the big right-hander, Gibbons and pitching coach Pete Walker were very happy with how it went.
“Everything went well. No pain in the finger,” Sanchez said. “Everything felt like it was coming out nice and easy. I was able to snap off my curve ball with no pain, with really no thought. Before, kind of when I got into that last bit of my delivery, kind of at the end, I was a little hesitant wondering if (the nail) was going to split or there’s going to be another problem. But the last four or five days, there’s been no issues, so everything’s on schedule.”
The plan now is for Sanchez to pitch in an extended spring training game on Tuesday in Florida and hopefully join the Jays next weekend in Toronto.
“It’s moving in the right direction. It makes me happy moving forward,” Sanchez said.
Sanchez, 25, returned from the DL last Sunday to face the Rays in Toronto and the outing turned out to be a disaster. The Barstow, Calif., native, who led the AL in ERA last season (3.00), lasted one inning when the nail on his right middle finger split, causing bleeding and discomfort, and he was put back on the DL.
“I shaved it down to where that split was,” Sanchez said. “But there’s nothing wrong with the blister. When we took that side of the nail out, it gave me no problems, it freed everything…
“It’s something you’ve got to deal with, understand if it takes 20 days to heal up and I’d be clear the rest of the year, and for the rest of my career, in the big picture of things, it doesn’t really seem that big.”
The Jays are scrambling for starters. Injuries to Sanchez and last year’s 20-game winner, lefty J.A. Happ, and the DFA at the end of last week of spot starter Mat Latos means the organization has had to do the old starting rotation two-step.
Sanchez has not been in a good place mentally. When you’re not playing, you almost become persona non grata. It’s even worse when the team is struggling.
“Obviously it’s awful, you come to the park and you just feel like you don’t contribute,” Sanchez said. “So I’m an energy guy on the bench now. I get these guys going as much as I can, but it’s just one of those things man, you take it with a grain of salt and you kind of just move on.”