MEANT TO BE HERE
I
t’s the middle of a night in early September when a knock on the bedroom door wakes Susana Lluch. Still in bed when the door quietly opens, she is somewhat startled to see her son, Alek Manoah, standing there. “Mom, I’m not feeling well,” he says.
At six-foot-six, 285 lbs., Manoah is a big man, a more intimidating physical presence than most major-league pitchers. However, in this moment, his size and strength don’t matter. He’s still the youngest of Lluch’s two sons and so his mother does what any mom would in this situation: She jumps out of bed.
Lluch is staying with Manoah and his girlfriend, Marielena, for a few days in his Toronto apartment before heading back to Florida, where she lives. Questioning Manoah, she finds out his stomach has been bothering him. He woke up with a tight chest and was unable to breathe, and thought he was in a nightmare.
Lluch hands him a sports drink to keep him hydrated, then waits it out with him to see if the feeling passes. Sitting with her son, she begins a mental accounting of their recent meals together, searching for potential sources of food poisoning. They met up in Texas during the Blue Jays’ series against the Rangers and took in a Dallas Cowboys game before travelling together to Toronto. Perhaps he picked up a bug on the trip, she thinks. Whatever the case, this is terrible timing: Manoah is slated to pitch at 1:07 p.m. in the opener of a crucial doubleheader against the division rival Tampa Bay Rays.
The right-hander manages to fall asleep around 6:30 a.m. He’s out for a few hours and when he wakes up, Lluch warms some soup on the stove. If they were at her home in Miami, she would have whipped up her tried-and-true chicken noodle from scratch. However, Manoah’s pantry is thin at the moment, so she has to settle for a can on the shelf. Manoah drinks the broth and is able to keep it down, which is a small victory.
Manoah texted Blue Jays trainer Jose Ministral in the middle of the night and now calls the team to provide an update on his condition. He offers to make his scheduled start in Game 1 but the team decides against that and tells him there’s a slight chance he could toe the rubber in the night game, depending on how he feels.
“I didn’t tell him not to go to work or to stay,” Lluch says. “That was a decision he would have to make on his own. So, I just told him that if he didn’t feel well, not to push himself because the team was going to need him for playoffs and it was better to miss a start than to get hurt or have something more serious happen.”
“I just wish this would just get out of my system already,” he tells her. “I don’t know why it had to happen right now.”
Manoah can be quite hard on himself, his mom says, even when situations are out of his control. It’s a quality that could hurt some ballplayers, but Manoah has found a way to channel it. His competitive fire has helped him achieve incredible success at this nascent stage in his career, his second year in the bigs. And it was burning ever so brightly, clearly visible through the sluggish haze of illness. Manoah dragged himself to the ballpark around 3 p.m., received some fluid via IV, and did in fact start Game 2. It was an amazing feat that, in a way, perfectly encapsulated the young pitcher. It also added to the lore of what’s been a truly magical season for him.
Manoah arrived in the majors in late May of last year and immediately impacted the Blue Jays, but few expected him to evolve the way he has in 2022 — to become a legitimate ace so quickly. The club has relied on him during some of its most crucial moments of the campaign, and he’s delivered without fail. The games that he pitches have become must-see events. Fans, media and players can’t be accused of hyperbole or recency bias when they talk of him in the same breath as franchise heroes Dave Stieb, Roger Clemens and Roy Halladay. Manoah has been that good this season. Manoah’s 2.24 ERA ranks second all-time by a Blue Jays starting pitcher, behind only Clemens’s 2.05 mark in 1997.
The best part of it all is there’s more of this fairytale chapter left for the right-hander to author with his performance this post-season. Manoah will take the mound on Friday against the Seattle Mariners in Game 1 of the American League wild card series and it will be, without a doubt, the most important game of his career. Talk to anyone around the Blue Jays and they’ll tell you he’s built for that moment. They’ve watched him develop into a different person with a different type of confidence than he exuded during his rookie campaign. He’s calmer now, more mature and operates with an aura of someone who’s much older than his 24 years.
To put it simply, he’s grown up a lot in a short time.
“He takes it upon himself to start being that leader and being that guy who is vocal,” says Blue Jays teammate Ross Stripling. “You know, we don’t necessarily have a ton of vocal leaders on this team and he’s kind of filling that void for us.”
O
ne of the standout moments from Manoah’s season came following a Blue Jays’ loss to the Baltimore Orioles in early September. It was an emotional series and an emotional game that saw tempers flare between the clubs. While the Orioles celebrated their triumph on the field on the Tuesday night, Manoah sat in the visitors’ dugout and watched. As his own teammates filed into the clubhouse, he didn’t move from his spot. He nodded to himself, his face remained stoic. Manoah was due to take the mound the next day and it was as if he was psyching himself up. That certainly worked as he proceeded to turn in one of his best outings of the season, tossing eight innings of three-hit, one-run ball to take the W.
The situation reminds Stripling of what he learned about Michael Jordan by watching the documentary miniseries The Last Dance. “Manoah was pissed about the loss,” says Stripling. “The next day, he goes eight innings. He kind of has like that Jordan quality to him. If you watch the doc, [Jordan] almost makes up that these young players were talking smack about him and uses that for motivation. I feel Like Manoah has that kind of edge to him where he can psych himself up for big situations and then go perform better because of it.”
Stripling, who the Blue Jays acquired from the Los Angeles Dodgers in the summer of 2020, says he’s enjoyed watching Manoah flourish and compares him to former teammate Walker Buehler. The two go about their business in different ways — Manoah is more jovial, Stripling says, while Buehler can be more edgy — yet they share the same heightened self-confidence and appetite for the big stage. In 2018, the Dodgers handed Buehler the ball for a decisive Game 163 against the Rockies in what was just his rookie season. He rose to the occasion and allowed just one hit over 6.2 scoreless innings to secure the victory. Buehler’s post-season dominance has continued over the years and Stripling believes Manoah will deliver there too.
“Essentially, 95 per cent of us get to this level and we’re like, ‘Do we belong here? Can I really get outs here? Can I really pitch at this level?’” says Stripling. “There’s a few who come up and are instantly like, ‘Yeah, I belong here. Not only can I get outs here, but I can also be elite. I can excel, and I’m gonna be confident about it. I’m going to be myself about it.’
“That is Walker Buehler to a tee. And that’s Manoah — he’s never not been himself. He has never wavered in confidence.”
That self-assurance has taken a different form this season than last, according to the people around Manoah. They point to the example of how he handled a dustup with the New York Yankees as proof. When Manoah hit slugger Aaron Judge on the elbow with a fastball during a late August game at Yankee Stadium, the benches cleared and there was a chance the situation could escalate. Manoah ignored the shouts coming from an angry Yankees dugout, particularly ace Gerrit Cole, and calmly approached Judge to tell him that it wasn’t on purpose and that he was just trying to get his fastball inside.
Stripling says Manoah’s handling of the situation showcased his maturity and growth. Last year, Manoah tended to show more emotion on the mound and if this same situation had arisen, maybe he would have handled it differently or used it to establish himself. “Now, he understands that, I don’t need to do that because the Yankees are aware of who I am and how I pitched to them and that I can get them out and I don’t need to chirp or go above to prove that I belong here,” says Stripling.
Lluch also believes that Manoah might have not reacted in the same manner last season and credits Blue Jays pitching coach Pete Walker as a calming influence on her son. Walker, she says, has effectively focused Manoah’s competitive spirit and altered his demeanour.
“I think it’s a more of a quiet confidence,” Walker says of his young ace. “He’s learned to control it a little bit. Controlled aggression. He’s not as animated as last season. On the field, he’s more concerned with getting outs and just focused on pitch to pitch. He’s still as aggressive as ever, but I think he’s learned to control that emotionally.”
Walker acknowledges the two have talked about the subject, but lauds Manoah for deploying his energy in the right places. That’s helped him get through a season in which he’s thrown more innings than ever before in his professional career. Walker, along with fellow Blue Jays hurlers, marvels at how Manoah has been able to consistently pitch deep into games and reach back for extra velocity in crucial, late-inning situations. He’s seasoned to the point where he’ll throw changeups in 3-2 counts or use his secondary pitches to get critical outs instead of relying on his fastball. All the while, he’s maintained a sense of looseness that’s unique.
Usually starting pitchers are islands unto themselves on days they throw — they abstain from talking with teammates between innings and elect to sit alone in the dugout. Manoah is the opposite. He’ll walk off the field and dap each teammate before hanging out on the railing with the other starting pitchers. He’ll joke with them for a little bit, refocus and then head right back to the mound.
“It’s been fun to watch him work,” says right-hander Kevin Gausman. “And he’s only going to get better — that’s the crazy thing — as good as he is now, he’s not even close in the grand scheme of things. He really has no idea what he’s doing right now if you think about it. I mean, man, when he gets some more reps and innings under his belt, the sky’s the limit.”
Gausman, who signed with the Blue Jays this past off-season, says he’s continually impressed by conversations with Manoah. He finds it especially interesting that the young starter frequently talks about how he wants to experience adversity. There have been times when Manoah has breezed through an easy outing with just a few baserunners and no real challenges, and he’ll come back to the dugout and tell Gausman that he actually wants more tough spots. “‘I need to see the bases loaded in the first inning so that I can get out of it. So, I know I’ve been here before,’” recalls Gausman of what Manoah has said in the past. “For a young guy to even recognize that he needs those things to make him better is really cool. When I was young, I definitely wasn’t thinking like, ‘Hey, give me adversity so I can get through it.’ I was wanting no adversity.”
Manoah’s mindset has brought him a different level of respect in the Blue Jays’ clubhouse. Being a leader in a professional sports can take different forms, and much of it occurs behind the scenes. However, when a Montreal-based sports broadcaster criticized the body of Blue Jays catcher Alejandro Kirk on Twitter, Manoah took it upon himself to respond in the most public of ways, tweeting about the dangers of body shaming and standing up for his teammate.
“I’m proud of him for doing that,” says Stripling. “And on a big stage, too. I know he’s got plenty of followers and I’m sure that spread around like wildfire. That’s some good insight into his personality and how, even at a young age, he’s protective of his teammates.”
Stripling, who turns 33 in November and is a veteran of seven big-league seasons, says that scenario is also emblematic of Manoah’s vocal style of leadership.
“Myself, George Springer, David Phelps, Jackie Bradley Jr. are these older, veteran guys with playoff experience, and we’re also probably more lead-by-example guys,” he notes. “Now, we’ll certainly take our time to say something or take someone under our wing or whatever. But, in general, not super vocal. I would say [third baseman]Matt Chapman is probably our most vocal leader — a guy who, day-in and day-out, will address the team before or after a game or on the bus. He’s very consistent about that. Then, I would say the next person is Manoah, as far as who is the most outspoken consistently in a leadership role.”
Stripling hung around Clayton Kershaw during their time together with the Dodgers and soaked up as much as he could from the future Hall of Famer. He’s open about sharing what he learned and lets young Blue Jays pitchers know about his routine, showing them how he goes about his business — they know they can find him each day in the weight room at a specific time and the training room at a specific time. However, Stripling says that he’s not the type to get in someone’s face as it’s just not his style.
“A big part of being a vocal leader is accountability and keeping people accountable and making sure guys are doing the right thing and all that kind of stuff,” he says. “So, yeah, you can lead by example, but then if someone gets off the beaten path, who’s going to set them straight? I’m not saying that has happened or it happens very often, but if that were to happen, I could say with 100-per cent confidence that it’s Chapman or Manoah that will take it upon themselves to go initiate that conversation.”
T
he hardest part of pitching when you’re sick comes during the game, when you’re in the dugout. You might be able to muster enough energy to get in a decent bullpen warm-up prior to first pitch and you might feel okay during the opening frame. But when you’re sitting on the bench and your team is hitting for 15 minutes, then you start to feel it. The adrenalin wears off and, all of a sudden, you remember how bad you’re feeling. It’s incredibly difficult to relaunch that adrenaline when you return to the field, to get yourself back up to the point where you can compete at max effort.
Lluch was in the stands at Rogers Centre watching her son as he tried to do exactly that. On the one hand, she was in awe at his determination, but on the other, she was concerned. She hoped that he wasn’t hiding how he truly felt and she noticed a few occasions during the game where he looked particularly pale. At one point, the right-hander was fiddling with the PitchCom device under his cap and pacing around the mound a little bit more than usual. Lluch read that as Manoah perhaps trying to stall for a few seconds to get past the ill feeling that was creeping up on him again.
Simply being on the mound was gutsy enough, but Manoah didn’t settle for simply turning up: He allowed two runs on five hits over 6.2 innings, walking two and striking out five. He earned a no-decision, yet kept his team in the game long enough for the Blue Jays to put up a four-spot in the seventh inning en route to a 7-2 victory.
“I told him I was very proud of him, like usual,” says Lluch of her first words to Manoah upon seeing him after the contest. He was still pale, but he had more energy than she expected given the day he’d just battled through.
Lluch can’t help but laugh when recounting it.
“I gave him a really big hug and he was like, ‘You hungry?’”
Winslow Townson/Getty Images; Mark Brown/Getty Images; Cole Burston/Getty Images; Vaughn Ridley/Getty Images.
