Grichuk strikes back in Buffalo
Outfielder taps Tulo on road to rebounding from brutal April
Randal Grichuk is hoping his second impression with the Blue Jays is better than his first.
The 26-year-old outfielder, who joined Toronto in the offseason and began the year as the starting right fielder, admittedly struggled in his first month, hitting .106 with two home runs, seven RBIs and 24 strikeouts. A knee injury suffered April 29 against the Texas Rangers knocked him out for weeks. Now inching his way back to the majors on a rehab assignment with the Triple-A Buffalo Bisons, after stops with the Class-A Advanced Dunedin Blue Jays and Double-A New Hampshire Fisher Cats, Grichuk is hoping for a fresh start.
“I’m definitely looking forward to getting another opportunity, to get some at-bats and kind of change the way I was looked at, I guess you’d say,” Grichuk said Thursday.
The knee is feeling better, he says, though that took longer than expected. The time off — especially the first two weeks or so, when he wasn’t able to swing the bat — allowed Grichuk to take a step back. He evaluated his first month, saw what the organization wanted him to work on with his mechanics, and tried to find a feel for it in a non-pressured environment.
“The first couple of weeks, I was hitting .070 or something but I felt good, so it was tough to change things up,” Grichuk said of his first 66 at-bats. “The ball was coming off my bat at a high exit (velocity) when I hit it — it was just kind of straight up. So I needed to figure out why it was going straight up and why I wasn’t hitting line drives, but physically I felt fine and mentally I felt fine.”
Grichuk went 2-for-3 with a pair of RBIs in the same game he suffered the injury, his first hits in 10 games. It gave the native of Texas some confidence, but by the time the Jays had arrived in Minnesota for their next series his knee “blew up.” He went on the disabled list a day later.
It was a frustrating turn of events, but he tried to turn lemons into lemonade by picking the brains of other veteran hitters recovering from injuries in Florida, including shortstop Troy Tulowitzki (heels) and fellow outfielder Steve Pearce (oblique).
“Knowing you don’t have to go out and perform that night, you’re able to go into the cage and work for an hour or two on something that doesn’t feel comfortable to see if it will feel comfortable,” Grichuk said. “Obviously Tulo is a good guy to learn from ... Took away a lot. Was just able to watch him hit and the intensity that he hits, it was good.”
Grichuk went 2-for-6 with a home run, two RBIs, five walks and three strikeouts in Dun- edin. In New Hampshire, he was 1-for-7 with a walk and two strikeouts. Back in Buffalo, he’s 2-for-8 with a home run, two RBIs and three strikeouts.
There’s an opportunity for Grichuk to return to the Jays and shine, if he’s able to produce at the plate. Kevin Pillar, Curtis Granderson and Teoscar Hernandez were hitting .310, .317 and .316 respectively when Grichuk went down; since then, they’ve hit .236, .169 and .223. The Jays’ most productive outfielder of late has been Dwight Smith Jr., hitting .300 in just 30 at-bats.
One thing that will likely remain the same when Grichuk returns is his hairstyle. He decided to change it up a little by cutting his once-flowing locks into a Mohawk in late April, which drew attention from teammate Lourdes Gurriel Jr. — also known for his coiffure — who ran his fingers through it in the dugout before Thursday’s game. Grichuk said there’s “no question” his mop is the better of the two: “He’s got good hair, I’m going to give it to him, but it doesn’t compare to this.”