TORONTO — Max Scherzer knows where the baseball calendar is and the realities of where the Toronto Blue Jays sit in the standings, and he isn’t interested in going there. The veteran right-hander, coming off five hitless innings of rehab work at triple-A Buffalo, is trending toward a return from the injured list and if he can hit the ground running, there’s sure to be interest from clubs seeking depth and experience for their pitching staffs.
In possession of full no-trade protection, however, Scherzer holds final say over his fate in the coming months. So, given the situation, would he consider a move should the Blue Jays get an offer for his services? What does he want for the rest of the year?
“There’s nothing for me to say,” he replied. “We have a job to do. We need to win baseball games. We’ve got to go one-and-oh today. When whatever happens, happens, we’ll talk about that at a different time. We have a job to do, go one-and-oh.”
Powered by seven strong innings from another potential trade candidate, Shane Bieber, the Blue Jays went one-and-oh Thursday, beating the Tampa Bay Rays 3-1 to avoid a four-game sweep against the American League East leaders.
By recent standards, the three runs felt like a breakout, as Ernie Clement cleverly scored in the first on Alejandro Kirk’s infield single after Junior Caminero overran the ball at third base, while the go-ahead run crossed on George Springer’s RBI single in the third and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. added some insurance with an RBI single in the seventh.
But, the heavy lifting fell to Bieber, along with relievers Tyler Rogers and Louis Varland, as the Blue Jays (47-56) ended the four-game losing streak that pushed them further toward sell mode ahead of the Aug. 3 trade deadline.
As they set off for Fenway Park six games back of the Red Sox (52-49), with five teams between them, for the third wild card, Bieber, much like Scherzer, sought to keep the focus on the present.
“I know that’s a boring answer, but all I can do is control what’s in front of me and that’s Washington (for his next start) and rooting the boys on in Boston,” he said. “They are obviously going on a great run and they’re on a tear, but all we can do is focus on what’s front of us and play each game like it’s our last and win ballgames and let the chips fall where they may.”
On the heels of his six shutout innings in Saturday’s 1-0 victory over the Chicago White Sox, the last time the Blue Jays won a game, Bieber’s three-hit, one-run, no-walk, three-strikeout effort should help raise interest in the pending free-agent righty, who doesn’t have any no-trade protection.
One rival evaluator said each outing between now and the deadline will really matter for Bieber as teams try to assess where he’s at after he missed half the season with elbow inflammation and has been building up on the fly in the majors. A second evaluator said as long as Bieber shows that he’s healthy, there will be a market for him because post-season calibre starters are difficult to acquire at the deadline, and he showed his mettle returning from Tommy John surgery in last year’s playoffs.
Manager John Schneider described Bieber as outstanding in “limiting hard contact against a really good offensive team” in the Rays, adding that he’s progressively getting sharper.
“He looks totally different right now than what he did his first couple,” said Schneider. “With delivery comes command. He’s been putting the ball where wants to the last couple of outings.”
The Blue Jays don’t feel the need to make deals for the sake of making them, so they’ll demand a certain talent threshold to complete any subtraction trade. So how teams view what Bieber — and their other players on expiring contracts — can offer will determine how deep any potential sell-off ends up going.
As that drama plays out, Schneider and the coaching staff remain fixated on helping their players turn the team’s fortunes, regardless of what the playoff odds say.
To that end, they’ve looked to the way the Red Sox, seemingly buried with playoff odds as low as 8.4 per cent back on June 21, not long after Toronto swept them in Boston, rallied to win 15 straight and return to relevance. Their playoff odds now, according to Fangraphs, stand at 62.1 per cent.
Last season, the Cincinnati Reds’ playoff odds stood at 6.6 per cent Aug. 7 and fell to 1.3 per cent on Sept. 4 before they rallied to win a wild-card spot. The Cleveland Guardians were at 12.2 per cent last July 31 and 2.5 per cent on Sept. 1 before they rallied to win the AL Central.
In 2024, the Detroit Tigers’ playoff odds stood at 0.3 per cent on Aug. 1 and sold at the deadline before winning a wild card, each a recent example for the Blue Jays to latch onto.
“For sure,” said Schneider. “Just yesterday we were sitting here talking, OK, if you say it’s July 23rd and you’re six-and-a-half out of first place in the division, you’re like, that’s attainable. I know it looks a little bit different now record-wise, and there are more teams involved, but yeah, you look at that, you look at the Red Sox, you look at the 2021 Braves who didn’t get over .500 ‘til August 6th. You’re waiting for it to turn, and I think you’re grasping on players performing better that can perform better, and you’re grasping on ways to try to make that happen quick, or quicker.
“Baseball is stupid, we talk about it all the time, and it can turn on a dime,” he continued. “We all know that it has to turn now and are frustrated that it hasn’t, but there’s always hope until there’s not. That’s the beauty of it. And that’s what we’re talking about, just meeting that head on.”
Thursday’s win pushed the Blue Jays’ playoff odds up from a season-low of 7.3 to 8.7 per cent, the type of slow incremental gain it will take to make a low-probability outcome happen.
“At this point, it’s just go play,” said Springer. “It’s do anything that you can to win the game. Everyone understands where we are and what’s at stake. At the end of the day, you don’t want to press but you have to play free and, you know, can’t be afraid to fail. Just go out there and play with your hair on fire, and we’ll see what happens.”
That’s Scherzer’s approach too.
Thinking about what the front office might do “is not our job,” he said. “I get the question. Fair. But, literally, it’s our job to go out there and play baseball and win a baseball game. We can’t do anything else. Once we get past that deadline and whatever happens happens, then we can talk about whatever needs to happen. But until that decision, until that day, your job is to go pitch and go one-and-oh.”
