If you’re looking for a reason to be nervous about the Toronto Blue Jays’ 10-11 start there is no shortage of options.
Many of the club’s hitters are mired in slumps, the bullpen, although it’s performing well, is missing some key pieces, and the back end of the rotation is as fluid as ever. Hyun-Jin Ryu’s injury — however minor — and George Springer’s continued absence can also be added to that list.
While each of those concerns has its own level of validity, the issue causing the most consternation in Blue Jays land at the moment has to be the infield defence — specifically the left side of Bo Bichette and Cavan Biggio.
Those two players enter the season in very different situations with Bichette having played his position for the entirety of his pro career while Biggio came into 2021 with 51 games at third as a pro. The result has been the same for both, though, as they’ve combined for 11 errors (more than nine entire teams) and made balls hit to their side of the infield far more eventful affairs than the Blue Jays would like. Errors are not the best way to measure defence, but failure to execute on that scale is a serious concern for the team, and it’s no surprise that Biggio ranks 215th out of 218 qualified fielders in Outs Above Average (-4) while Bichette is dead last (-7).
With numbers like that, an above-average shortstop playing second, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. looking far more feasible at third than he has in recent memory, it’s no surprise there’s been plenty of daydreaming about alternative defensive configurations
For now, it doesn’t appear the Blue Jays are entertaining anything drastic (although Biggio has played three of his last five games in right field) so the question becomes: how important is left infield defence, and can the club survive subpar play there?
While each team’s ability to overcome its shortcomings varies, history can provide a bit of a guide here. Since the current playoff format was instated, there have been eight full seasons, with 10 teams making the playoffs each season (we can get rid of 2020 for its different format and small sample). That means we have a solid sample of 80 teams that represent the model of a modern playoff club.
If those 80 consistently had excellent defence at third and short (particularly short) or — perhaps more relevant to the Blue Jays’ interests — the group doesn’t include teams with leaky left sides, that should raise further red flags for Toronto.
Right now, the Blue Jays’ left side is on pace to be worth -45.6 runs below average over the course of the season by UZR. If that sounds like an alarming number, it’s because it is — especially in the context of these playoff teams.
While it’s not uncommon for a team playing October baseball to be below average at shortstop and third (42.5 percent of the aforementioned sample were), being that bad is something else entirely. Out of the 80 teams, the worst in this area is the 2017 Arizona Diamondbacks who posted a UZR of -18.2.
It breaks down like this:
In simple terms, a few takeaways from this chart:
• These playoff teams weren’t extraordinary when it came to this specific sliver of team defence. With the exception of 2016, mostly the 10-team groups tend to float relatively close to zero. All 80 squads averaged +2.4 UZR from these positions. There is no one way to build a great baseball team, and it would’ve been shocking if the secret sauce staring us in the face all along was “good defence at third base and short”.
• 2016 was a heck of an October for left-side defensive wizardry, which the Blue Jays greatly contributed to with their pairing of Troy Tulowitzki and Josh Donaldson (+11.1 UZR).
• In almost every season, there’s at least one playoff team that faces significant struggles in this area and makes the playoffs. In one case, a club fitting that description — the 2017 Houston Astros (-14.0 UZR) — won the World Series, but the less said about that team the better.
Theoretically, there are too many components to a baseball team for a single weakness to be totally disqualifying and if Bo Bichette and Cavan Biggio continue to struggle that doesn’t doom the Blue Jays’ 2021 chances. However, keeping their current pace would make life unbelievably difficult for the team. The 2017 Arizona Diamondbacks survived their significantly less dire struggles by employing five starters who each threw at least 150 innings, posted an ERA of 4.03 or lower, and accumulated 2.5 WAR or more. The 2021 Blue Jays aren’t going to have that.
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What they do have is options, unlike those Diamondbacks who were stuck with Jake Lamb’s butchery at third base because they need his 30-homer bat in their lineup. Their first port of call is counting on internal improvement. It seems safe, for instance, to assume that Bichette won’t make the 46 errors he’s currently on pace for. Despite their struggles, neither Bichette nor Biggio are so radically unsuited to their position that they project as the worst defenders in the game. The presence of Marcus Semien on the roster also allows the Blue Jays room to maneuver if the current issues persist, even in a lesser form.
Right now, the left side of the Blue Jays’ infield is causing them significant issues that will eat into their playoff hopes — if they continue at this clip, or, frankly, anything close to it. That’s a big if, though. Whether it’s via raw regression to the mean or some kind of personnel adjustment, there’s no reason to believe they can’t get this situation under control.
If the numbers tell us anything, it’s that strong defence at these positions isn’t a prerequisite for a successful season — but if that area of the field becomes a black hole where sure outs go to die, the path to the playoffs certainly gets tougher.
