Blue Jays’ Pitching Problems Continue

The Toronto Blue Jays are contenders. They are currently four games above .500, two games out of first place, and their positive run differential of 81 is first in the American League by nearly 30 runs. The FanGraphs playoff odds give the Jays a roughly one-in-two chance to qualify for the playoffs. The Jays offense has been the key, scoring close to five-and-a-half runs per game. The Blue Jays are 60 runs above average on offense, first in major-league baseball, and their 115 wRC+ for non-pitchers is second to only the Dodgers — and those two teams have a 25-run gap on the bases. Their Base Runs record is four games better than their actual record, indicating the team easily could have better results than their current record indicates. The problem for the Blue Jays has been the pitching staff, both in the rotation and in the bullpen. The easy answer is to trade for outside help, but deploying internal solutions in different roles could prove helpful as well.

Before moving to the pitching, a final note on the offense. The offense has carried the team thus far, but it is unlikely to continue to be as great over the course of the rest of the season. The graph below shows every team’s actual runs per game so far this season compared with their Base Runs, which should be a better representation of how a team’s offense has performed.

The Twins have been benefited the most, but the Blue Jays are not far behind. Even if the Blue Jays had scored at their Base Runs level, those five runs per game would still lead MLB. The projections agree that the Blue Jays should still have a terrific offense going forward, averaging 4.6 runs per game, even with the Red Sox for the best in baseball. No matter which angle we look from, the Blue Jays have and will continue to have a great offense. The same does not hold true for the pitching staff.

Losing Marcus Stroman before the season was a major blow for the Blue Jays. It moved Drew Hutchison to Opening Day starter and forced both Aaron Sanchez and Daniel Norris into the rotation to start the season. The pitching has struggled all year, with their 4.25 ERA and 4.19 FIP near the bottom of the league. While we might expect the Blue Jays offense to regress a little bit going forward, the underlying statistics do not support an opposite turnaround for the pitching staff. Using the same method from above, here is every team’s runs allowed minus Base Runs allowed thus far.

The Blue Jays might have been expected to allow fewer runs, but it is not a significant amount. Like the offense, the projections align with the current performance, as Toronto is expected to allow 4.5 runs per game, a slight increase from the performance so far this season. At first glance the main problem appears to be the rotation: its 4.47 ERA and 4.52 FIP are very poor and the starters’ 2.9 WAR is ahead of only the Colorado Rockies and Philadelphia Phillies. The bullpen’s 3.67 ERA and 3.63 FIP are both in the middle of the pack, but the Blue Jays have yet to find a reliable presence at the back end of games. The Blue Jays have tied the A’s for most blown saves with 12, and their -3.78 win probability added (WPA) is better than the aforementioned A’s.

On the Fangraphs player pages and leaderboards, Shutdowns and Meltdowns can help provide more context for reliever performance than saves or blown saves. These statistics are based on WPA, with a performance of at least +.06 considered a shutdown and a performance of -.06 or worse considered a meltdown. These statistics are performance-based and not predictive, but do show how effective a bullpen has been. The Blue Jays have 40 shutdowns, slightly better than only the A’s (again) and the Cleveland Indians. They also have 39 meltdowns, worse than the A’s and better than only Diamondbacks, Cubs, Rangers, and Braves. The below graph shows shutdowns minus meltdowns for every team. Only the A’s have a lower differential than the Blue Jays.

Identifying the problem is only half the battle; solutions are much more difficult. Bullpens are notoriously volatile and in such a small sample of innings, drastic changes are possible, but not much was expected of this bullpen at the beginning of the year so the current performance cannot be a big surprise. I wrote about the Blue Jays’ very same pitching problems two weeks into the season with the following closing thoughts:

The team could flip the roles of Aaron Sanchez and Marco Estrada to potentially help both the bullpen and the rotation, but if Daniel Norris’ dead arm does not recover soon, the Blue Jays have few options to keep the back end of the rotation productive.

Marco Estrada did enter the rotation and has pitched well and benefited from plays like this:

Estrada did not enter the rotation due to a change in strategy. Daniel Norris had trouble recovering from dead arm and was sent to the minors. Sanchez never had a chance to go to the bullpen and, despite an ERA of 3.55, he’s produced a 5.19 FIP with 37 walks to just 42 strikeouts. It is questionable whether he will be a real benefit to the rotation after returning from the disabled list. The Blue Jays are currently operating without a fifth starter after sending fill-in Scott Copeland back to the minors. Drew Hutchison was originally thought to receive Saturday’s start due to an off-day yesterday, but after he struggled on Monday, the choice may come down to Felix Doubront and Todd Redmond (Edit: or maybe prospect Matt Boyd).

A trade is the easy answer, and Jeff Sullivan has previously floated a monster Aroldis Chapman–Johnny Cueto blockbuster that would immediately fill the Blue Jays’ needs. Removing Brett Cecil from the closer role and inserting 20-year-old Roberto Osuna could help some of the Blue Jays’ problems. Daniel Norris has been inconsistent in the minors, but he could be a start away from coming back up to the big leagues.

Blue Jays’ general manager Alex Anthopolous has said that the rotation is more of a priority than the bullpen and they still view Sanchez as a starter this season and long-term. Sanchez could help the rotation once he comes off the disabled list, but that still leaves problems in the bullpen. For this season, what was true two months ago is still true today: Aaron Sanchez could help stabilize the bullpen, but without Daniel Norris at the back of the rotation the Blue Jays have limited options. If the team is not satisfied with Norris’ progress, the only reasonable option to bolster the pitching staff might be outside the organization.