DUNEDIN, Fla. — In the early innings of a 7-2 loss to the Baltimore Orioles last June 3, Kevin Gausman twice made the pitch he wanted to Anthony Santander and ended up with the wrong result. The first was an 0-2 chase fastball up and away swatted over the right-field wall for a two-run homer in the second inning to open the scoring. The second was a 1-2 splitter way down and away slashed to left field for a one-out single that led a three-run fourth.
Mistakes frustrated Gausman in that outing. Those two pitches weren’t among them.
“He’s kind of had my number so I’m happy he’s on my team now,” the Toronto Blue Jays ace recalled this spring of his now-teammate. “I love his approach. He’s fine with taking a single or two — he’s not trying to hit a home run every time. But he hit 44 home runs last year so he has that power capability, too.”
That poise and power is why the Blue Jays targeted Santander when he became a free agent this off-season, eventually signing the 30-year-old switch-hitter to a $92.5-million, five-year contract last month. Between an analytical approach to hitting, experience in the middle of the order and ability to provide power from both sides of the plate, he offers a too-often punchless lineup the past couple of years a lot of what it’s been missing.
Demonstrative of all that are those two at-bats against Gausman.
In the first encounter, Gausman opened with three straight fastballs in the zone, going in, out, in as he climbed the ladder, before Santander fouled off a chase splitter away. Having changed his eye level once, Gausman did it again with the fastball that ended up over the wall.
The next time, Gausman opened with a high fastball Santander chased for strike one, missed with a low splitter, got a foul tip with a middle-away fastball, another tip on a middle-down splitter before the fateful chase splitter was lashed to left.
“Both of them were really good pitches,” Santander recalled. “I was ready to hit them and I hit them.”
At the time, Gausman surmised that he had sold out for those pitches.
Is that part of his approach?
“Ready for the fastball and try to cover those pitches,” Santander replied, “try to not chase.”
Such canniness in the batter’s box is a key part of Santander’s success with the Orioles, where he grew from an unlikely high-A Rule 5 pick out of the Cleveland system in 2016 to a dependable middle-of-the-order slugger with 105 homers the past three years.
While manager John Schneider continues to call how the Blue Jays will set their batting order a work in progress, “having him behind Vlad is where we want to land in some way, shape or form.”
The Blue Jays have lacked a presence like Santander since Teoscar Hernandez was traded to the Seattle Mariners after the 2022 season, and restoring that secondary threat, along with a return to form by Bo Bichette, should make the lineup more productive.
“When you have a guy behind (Guerrero) who hit 44 homers last year, that’s a real thing,” said Schneider. “Vlad, you could say, didn’t operate with that threat beyond him last year and did just fine. But it makes a pitcher think, OK, who do I want to beat me? Where do I think my stuff plays better? Hopefully that works for both of them.”
Gausman sees it similarly, believing that Santander will “free up Vladdy to be able to do what he can do and not feel the pressure of having to be the one big bat.” But he also notes the difference having a switch-hitter in that spot will make, too, complicating the way opposing managers lineup their leverage relievers.
That’s one of many small edges the Blue Jays are trying to capitalize upon this season as they seek to forge a better whole from the sum of their parts.
“Hopefully he can see better pitches because I’m a (switch-hitting) power threat and he can take advantage of that and get some big hits for us with runners in scoring position and get some runs in the first inning,” Santander said of Guerrero. “It’s going to be exciting. He’s a great hitter. Every time we go to the cage, I go with him to try to pick up something to get better and better.”
YARBROUGH RETURNS: Ryan Yarbrough joined camp Friday after agreeing to a minor-league deal, and with the Blue Jays having a clear vision for how he fits the bullpen, he opens up different usage options for others, Yariel Rodriguez prime among them.
The Cuban righty, used as a starter last season, will end up in the bullpen if he’s not needed for the rotation and the original thinking was that he could serve in a swing/length role, at least in part, as needed. But if Yarbrough breaks camp, he can step into the bulk/swing role, allowing Rodriguez to be another option for mid-to-high leverage, something he did in Japan with Chunichi for three years.
“The luxury you have with Yarbs is that he is very equipped to do a lot of things, he’s done that for the past handful of years and knows how to get himself ready for that,” said John Schneider. “You don’t want to have too many guys waiting to throw length and then you’re wearing out other guys. So if you can count on Yarbs for some length, you can shorten Yariel a little bit, if he is there. We’re still planning on building up Yariel as a starter and keeping some length with Yarbs, too.
“There are a lot of different ways he can help us win.”
While Yarbrough will be playing some catchup as a late addition to camp, Schneider told him not “to put extra emphasis on his outings” and instead focus on being ready for the season.
“There’s a huge trust factor there from myself and Pete (Walker) and all of us,” he said. “So go do your thing, get ready and we know you can help us. We’re envisioning a similar role to last year.”
HITTING GAMES: On their final day of prep before they open Grapefruit League play Saturday against the New York Yankees, the Blue Jays engaged in a quasi-intrasquad game built around situational hitting.
The brainchild of new hitting coach Dave Popkins and assistant Lou Iannotti, the roster was split into Team Bichette and Team Guerrero and played two innings, one in which batters had a clean count and a runner on second, one in which batters had a 3-2 count and the bases loaded, with the goal to bring home as many runs as possible.
“New thing,” said John Schneider. “George (Springer) actually did that in Houston years ago. … Focusing on situations is an area that we’re going to emphasize this this spring in camp and into the season. I thought the guys did a great job and had fun with it.”
Prioritizing attention to detail was a focal point of the 2023 camp — “I felt like I said that a lot and it didn’t work out,” said Schneider — and it’s back once again. “There are margins in every game and we’ve got to win the margins. There’s a lot of talent here, but we have to focus on those things, whether it’s at the plate or on the bases, it’s something we’re talking about a lot, how can we add on an extra run and what that does to the trajectory of your season win/loss-wise. So we’re going to continue to do things like that and continue to talk about that.”
