Breaking down Toronto's relief struggles

This story was excerpted from Keegan Matheson’s Blue Jays Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

WASHINGTON -- The Blue Jays’ bullpen is going through it.

This isn’t in the same realm as Toronto’s struggles on offense, which point to a deeper, more foundational issue, but it’s not exactly helping things.

Bullpens are notoriously volatile. There was bound to be some natural regression from last year’s group, but the Blue Jays hoped they’d built enough talent that a success story or two could offset that. Yimi García is a fine example of that, and through his first 13 1/3 innings he’s pitching like an All-Star -- far and away the best baseball of his MLB career.

García owns a 0.68 ERA with 16 strikeouts and just four hits allowed, throwing harder than he ever has. It’s been remarkable to watch, but when García curiously didn’t appear in a moment tailor-made for him Friday in Washington, something seemed off. Soon after, the news came that García was dealing with a minor lower back issue. It’s the last thing the Blue Jays needed to hear.

Just over a month in, here’s how the bullpen group ranks compared to the rest of baseball (entering Sunday).

ERA: 5.18 (28th in MLB)
HR: 21 (2nd-most in MLB)
K/9: 7.74 (26th in MLB)

Injuries are at the heart of this, of course, and so many of those situations will take care of themselves with time, but one that’s felt more worrying is Erik Swanson. After taking over from Yusei Kikuchi in Friday’s opener against the Nationals, Swanson quickly allowed a three-run home run and couldn’t record an out.

John Schneider floated the idea that Swanson may have been tipping pitches after the loss, and the numbers sure point to something being wrong. Swanson has allowed 10 runs on 12 hits over just five innings.

“We talked to him a little about that today,” Schneider said Saturday, “mainly just catching up with him. Swanny is one of the best humans on our team. Maybe I’m a little bit biased, but he’s been through a lot, obviously, in the last couple of months. We were mainly just checking in with him. We talked about that a little bit. Every pitcher has tendencies. It’s just so available in today’s game.”

It’s important to keep the context in any conversation with Swanson. In the middle of Spring Training, Swanson’s four-year-old son, Toby, was hit by a vehicle and airlifted to the hospital. The Blue Jays rallied around Swanson, who is a beloved teammate, and the mental toll of what he and his family have been through has to be given some space here.

Swanson was away from the team for a time and, soon after returning, experienced some right forearm tightness that landed him on the IL to open the season.

Since rejoining the Blue Jays, though, Swanson hasn’t looked like his 2023 self, and that version of him was such a crucial piece of the bullpen. Again, all signs point towards Swanson tipping some of his pitches.

“If there are things you are doing that are putting you at a bit of a disadvantage, you’ve got to get out of that,” Schneider said. “I think that’s why Pete [Walker] has no hair. Pitch tipping.”

Swanson’s bounce-back is the biggest variable in all of this. With him alongside a healthy García, the Blue Jays would have a back end that can go up against most bullpens in baseball, but this organization can’t just snap its fingers and make that happen.

While Tim Mayza has rebounded admirably from his early struggles, Chad Green (right teres major strain) is on the IL and just starting to throw from a distance on flat ground. The same goes for Bowden Francis (right forearm extensor tendinitis), who fits so well as this bullpen’s long man when healthy. Perhaps Yariel Rodríguez factors into that picture, too, when he returns from an IL stint for thoracic spine inflammation.

It’s never good news in baseball when body parts are being listed.

The Blue Jays’ rotation looks like it’s in fine shape now and only needs Alek Manoah to be serviceable in his return. That group alone is propping up Toronto's offense, dragging it deep into games and giving it so many chances to change the narrative, but this organization can’t afford to have its bullpen stumble. Those, at this point, would be backbreakers.

There’s plenty of time for this to change -- completely change -- but the early picture is that of a bullpen much, much different from the one we saw a year ago.