What Blue Jays leaders had to say ahead of Game 1
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.
Bo Bichette doesn’t tend to waste words.
He doesn’t deliver monologues, nor does he need to. After Bichette took a moment to consider just why these 2023 Blue Jays are better suited for postseason baseball than last year’s group, he described their pitching and defense as “amazing,” then raised an eyebrow and added:
“I still think we have a pretty good offense, too.”
Bichette knows the narratives about this club’s offense. It’s a group that led the league in home runs just two years ago, but has dropped to seventh and 16th over the past two seasons. That’s no tragedy, particularly when paired with those sharp upticks in pitching and defense, but Bichette made it clear that this group can still get it done. He certainly can, coming off another exceptional season at the dish.
Those are the changes you can measure. If you think this offense is a weakness, there are numbers waiting to arm your argument. If you think this pitching staff and outfield defense can smother teams this postseason, the numbers have your back, too. Where this gets more interesting is when it comes to the unmeasurable.
“Experience is the first thing that comes to mind,” general manager Ross Atkins said. “You can feel it in our clubhouse. You can feel back to the pandemic year, our first year in the playoffs with this group, a different level of confidence.”
Let’s ask some of this club’s leaders about that.
BO BICHETTE
There’s a level of introspection to Bichette that’s evident this season, alongside his leadership traits. He appreciates these moments more by the year because he respects the rarity of success in Major League Baseball.
“I think we’ve learned that it’s really difficult to accomplish what every team sets out to accomplish when Spring Training starts,” Bichette said. “This year is going to be no different. The Twins are a great team with a lot of great players, so we’re going to have to play well.”
This is where “experience” starts. Early failures can be valuable when the right clubhouse turns it into fuel for the next season.
CAVAN BIGGIO
There’s a closeness in the clubhouse that makes Triple-A players joining the Blue Jays feel immediately seen and welcomed. The core players around since the brief 2020 run feel this, too.
“I think that’s the biggest thing: culture. As a team, to win the World Series you have to have that,” Biggio said. “It’s the most important thing. Baseball is behind that. This group is the closest group by far, for me, that I’ve ever been with.”
KEVIN GAUSMAN
“For a lot of those guys -- and I said this last year -- it was their first postseason experience outside of COVID,” Gausman said. “It was really the first time they’d experienced Rogers Centre, full capacity and as crazy as those fans can be. Tomorrow, some of those guys who experienced that for the first time, they’re not going to be as shocked to see that type of environment.”
GEORGE SPRINGER
Life is different in the postseason. Instead of shuffling outside the clubhouse to meet with six or eight reporters in the regular season, Springer walked into a press conference room of a hundred chairs Monday afternoon at Target Field. This is part of the experience, too.
“I think you just learn how to navigate the day,” Springer said. “You learn how to not necessarily think about what you have to go do, you just think about the task at hand. Obviously, we play 162-plus games a year. There are a lot of stretches everything can get monotonous, can get a little autopilot, if that’s the right word. Here, now, everything is on the line every day.”
This year, unlike 2022, the Blue Jays are on the road. They lost at home a year ago to the Mariners, which only added to the incredible heartbreak, but the road is what you make of it. On one hand, you’re out of your comfort zone. On the other hand, these players have lived their lives out of suitcases for years, and veterans learn how to rebrand this as having fewer distractions.
“You’re just in a hotel,” Springer said. “You’re not at home. You’re not in your own bed. You’re not doing the things you’d normally do in your own house. At the end of the day, when you’re on the road, you expect it to be loud and you expect to have the other fans be into the games. You expect it to be anti-you, which is OK. This is what you play for.”
Keegan Matheson covers the Blue Jays for MLB.com.