WILL ‘JOHNNY’ BE GOOD 3 YEARS IN A ROW?
Dustin Johnson leads elite field into Canadian Open hoping to knock Jhonattan Vegas off his throne,
Aledmys Diaz gets the force on Minnesota’s Mitch Garver in the second inning but can’t complete the double play. That extra out was nowhere to be found in the 11th, as the Twins completed a three-game sweep.
Until a J.A. Happ trade is actually announced, there will continue to be reports from insiders virtually every waking hour of every day until the deadline. But with a deal for Happ a virtual certainty, with Marco Estrada suffering a setback in his first rehab start, with Jaime Garcia banished to the bullpen, and with Aaron Sanchez’s return an unknown with lingering bruised finger woes, where would that leave the Blue Jays in terms of a Happ-less starting rotation over the final months? There was a Wednesday report on Twitter from Mark Feinsand of MLB.com, right around the start of the JaysTwins game, that a deal for Happ was imminent. That report was walked back slightly as the game unfolded, with Feinsand bringing in the Yankees and Brewers, while the Cubs and Phillies were said to also have interest.
Even Jays manager John Gibbons understands that the odds are strong that, when his team returns from the upcoming 10-game road trip to Chicago, Oakland and Seattle, his roster will have changed significantly.
“I don’t know what’s actually going to happen, but I got a feeling there’ll be a couple of moves,” Gibbons said in an answer tinged with fatalism. “Yeah, I think something will happen. Things are starting to move out there anyway. Of course if they trade a guy or two here, they may acquire somebody they can insert in there too. I haven’t got that far ahead, but that’s the reality.”
The Jays’ starters will be younger, but the thought of going young with one’s rotation is not necessarily a sign of pending disaster. If Estrada stays and Happ leaves, and if one includes the Jays currently on the DL, here is an organizational depth chart of starting pitchers with current ages in parentheses:
Marcus Stroman (26), Estrada (35), Sanchez (26), Ryan Borucki (24), Sam Gaviglio (28), Sean Reid-Foley (22), Thomas Pannone (24) and T.J. Zeuch (23).
It should be noted that, in the Jays’ eight-man starting pitcher depth chart, there are four that are 24 years old or younger. That should not be a scary number. Through the first four months, major-league teams had seen 388 starts and 131 wins from a total of 52 pitchers that were 24 or younger.
An all-star six-man rotation of young big-league starters is impressive: the Yankees’ Luis Severino (24), 14-3 with a 2.63 ERA; the Twins’ Jose Berrios (24), 10-7, 3.48; the Astros’ Lance McCullers Jr. (24), 10-5, 4.01; the Phillies’ Zach Eflin (24), 7-2, 3.41; the Dodgers’ Walker Buehler (23), 4-1, 2.72; and injured Angels phenom Shohei Ohtani (23), 4-1, 3.10 ERA. With Happ presumed gone and Garcia now working exclusively out of the bullpen, there are opportunities out there for the Jays’ youngsters. Borucki has already cemented a starting role for the rest of the schedule, while Gibbons insists he has been impressed enough with Gaviglio, who had a nodecision in the Jays’ 12-6, extrainnings loss Wednesday. He believes his actual 13-start performance has been better than his stat line.
“He’s got a couple of games where he got hit around a little bit, but other than that he’s been good,” Gibbons said. “Better than I’ve expected, put it that way. I want to see Gaviglio as a starter first. I’d heard he could do this, he could do that. But you could do either (start or relieve) with him. I think if he ended up in the pen some day, shoot, I think he’d be really good because you know he’s going to come in and throw strikes. He’s got the good breaking ball he can spot. But he’s been very good as a starter and everybody’s always looking for starters.”
Estrada is a tough trade now, but might be easier to move in August after clearing waivers, for a contender that is looking for a pitcher with a good track record in the post-season. At that point, the next man up in Toronto would likely be the right-hander Reid-Foley. In 21 starts at the top two levels of the Jays system, the Florida native is 12-2, with a 2.95 ERA and 130 strikeouts in 110 innings, allowing just 79 hits.
Reid-Foley was selected by the Jays in the second round of the 2014 June draft of amateur free agents, eighth overall. Already in the majors from that same draft have been 25 other pitchers, including Aaron Nola (Phillies), Jordan Montgomery (Yankees), Luke Weaver (Cardinals) and Brandon Finnegan (Royals).
It’s not the age as much as the experience. For instance, on Tuesday, when Borucki was confronted with an error in left field, it led to his only two runs allowed, both unearned. The losses would be there because of the lack of experience in dealing with certain adversity, but the talent of the new Jays would be evident.
“I think (veterans) learn to deal with it better,” Gibbons said. “Mistakes are part of the game, but they cost you. Then the pitcher’s got to take it on his shoulders too. OK, I’ve got to help my team overcome that too. I’ve got to get this guy out. I’ve got to make a big pitch, or whatever it is. You just can’t always let it snowball that way either. We’re all in it together anyways.”
A certain segment of Jays fans want to blow up the roster. If that happens in the next five days, it could prove to be a rocky ride in the final two months but it’s all part of rebuilding and looking towards a 2020 vision.