TORONTO – No matter how he performed against the Boston Red Sox, Nate Pearson wasn’t going to pitch himself on or off the Toronto Blue Jays’ opening day roster Tuesday night.
“That wouldn’t be fair to the kid,” manager Charlie Montoyo said before watching the top pitching prospect allow four runs – all in the first inning – on five hits with two walks and five strikeouts over 3.2 innings in the club’s first game versus a rival club since March 12.
“I’m just hoping he does what he does, building on the way he’s been pitching. He’s facing a pretty good lineup so that’s a great test.”
Regardless of how you grade the exam – at times, during Tuesday’s 8-6 win over the Red Sox he looked like a 23-year-old pitching in a big-league stadium for the first time, more often, he simply overmatched his opponents – what’s fair to the kid is a spot in the Blue Jays rotation.
Even under these bizarre circumstances, Pearson has earned it, building off an impressive showing at the first spring training during the pandemic shutdown, and looking sharp again throughout summer camp in Toronto with his elite, nearly unrivalled arsenal. Against the Red Sox, he generated eight swinging strikes on 63 pitches – three on fastballs, three on sliders, two on changeups – sitting at 95.1 m.p.h. while topping out at 98.1.
He settled himself down after surrendering a three-run homer to Mitch Moreland in the first, a 95.3 m.p.h. fastball he left out over the plate, and will learn from the experience of resetting himself in the big-league environs, even if the usually hostile Fenway Park stands were empty.
To say that he can make the same type of developmental strides at the club’s Alternative Training Site is as implausible as it is to say that he isn’t among the five best Blue Jays starting pitchers right now. Still, his roster fate is more a business decision than it is a baseball decision, which is why his status remains uncertain with opening day rosters due Thursday afternoon.
“I felt like I put myself in the best position I can to make this team,” said Pearson. “Whether they say I made it or not, I’m still going to keep working as hard as I normally do and I know my time will come at some point this year. Just got to roll with the punches and keep getting back on the horse. I didn’t have the best outing today. It’s tough being my last spring training outing, but I showed them what I can do throughout all whole spring training, that’s what I have to roll with.”
What complicates things for the Blue Jays is that if they hold him down for roughly a week and a half, they can push his free agency back by a full season. If Pearson becomes what he’s projected to be, that season is worth tens of millions and viewed strictly through a business lens, having him break camp borders on negligence.
The thing is, the way teams manipulate service time is a corrosive force that can strain the relationship between player and team, even when someone is as aware and savvy as Pearson. For a team seeking to establish a meritocracy, the Blue Jays can’t say they’re breaking camp with the best team, as they’ve promised to do all camp, if he’s not on it.
Further, there’s a danger in the message holding back such an important potential weapon would send to a young team whose uber-confidence was continually cited by president and CEO Mark Shapiro and GM Ross Atkins as reasons why signing ace Hyun-Jin Ryu made sense.
If the Blue Jays believe in their roster as much as they say, then surrendering the extra season of control is simply the cost of doing business. If he turns into an ace, then they should try to extend him well before that extra year of control becomes a factor, anyway.
Things might be different if the minor leagues were running this year, but they’re not. To say he’s going to do anything in at the Alternative Training Site that would benefit him more than Tuesday’s outing is ludicrous.
Consider his process working through fastball command issues early in the outing.
“You problem solve, you look at where you’re missing,” said Pearson. “I was missing high and I was also missing down and away to righties, like really bad. I had to figure out what I was doing and I figured it out in the third and fourth inning that I was collapsing on my back leg and I wasn’t staying tall enough. As soon as I was able to figure that out, I told Pete (Walker, the pitching coach) ‘I figured it out. Let’s go.’ I told (Danny Jansen) to ‘keep calling the heater, I’m going to get it back.’ And eventually, I started getting it back there.”
There is nothing the Blue Jays can create this season to replicate that game experience, which is why a demotion later this week would be a blatant manipulation of service time.
The players association would surely consider grieving such a decision, and unlike the failed filing recently settled in favour of the Chicago Cubs over Kris Bryant, there’s less subjective decision-making here.
Pearson won’t be bumping an experienced big-league out of a roster spot with teams carrying 30 players out of the gate. There’s nowhere else for him to get the one thing he really needs – meaningful innings. It’s a case that has a real shot.
Getting to that point would be a terrible outcome for the Blue Jays, who want to position themselves as an organization that puts the player first. In Pearson’s case, putting the player first means putting him on the opening day roster, even if the cost of a week and a half, ends up being a full year.
