TORONTO – Enemies turned into friends when Kevin Kiermaier signed with the Toronto Blue Jays back in December and Friday night, friends turn into enemies when the centre-fielder faces his old team, the Tampa Bay Rays, for the first time.
“I’ll be excited to play against them when it matters,” he says. “I feel like I had my day in spring training when I saw everyone and I got my conversations, my hugs and all that out the way. I told them, ‘Once the regular season comes, I’m going to be a little bit more about my business and we’re going to try beat you guys as much as we can.’ So it’ll be good seeing them. They’re playing great, obviously, and we’re hoping to hand them their first loss and maybe a couple more. We’ll see. Looking forward to competing against them.”
At 13-0 with an absurd run differential of plus-71, the Rays are certainly coming in hot.
On Thursday, their 9-3 trouncing of the Boston Red Sox put them alongside the 1987 Milwaukee Brewers and Atlanta in 1982 as the only modern-era teams to begin a season with 13 straight wins, another perfect week short of the 1884 St. Louis Maroons (20-0).
The Blue Jays, meanwhile, have won three of four series so far and at 8-5, are off to a good start of their own, tied for second in the American League East with the New York Yankees. Still, this weekend will be an early litmus test not just for them but also the Rays, who have played only last-placed clubs to this point.
“Uniquely hot,” is how manager John Schneider describes them. “They’re obviously a good team, they’re a complete team and they’re playing a good brand of baseball, right now. It’s going to be a fun series. We know how they deploy, how they match up. It’s a credit to what they do, the start they got off to.”
The Rays tend to be a Blue Jays nemesis, winning the season series in eight of the past 10 years, but save for 2018-2019 during the Toronto rebuild, the results haven’t been as lopsided as the narrative around the rivals tends to be.
In 2020, the Rays took the season series 6-4 and swept a two-game series in the playoffs. It was 11-8 in 2021 and 10-9 for Tampa last year. Even at Tropicana Field, renowned as a house of horrors for the Blue Jays, their record there in the last three years is a combined 11-14 – one under even each time – it’s really the tear-down seasons during which they were 4-15 there that skews recent perception.
Kiermaier noted the juxtaposition, saying since he arrived he’s heard about how the Rays are some sort of kryptonite. But from the other side, he “always thought it was like 10-9, 11-8, nothing too crazy,” and rightly so as it turns out.
“They’ve never had a lot of household names but we had a lot of guys on the team who did the little things right and especially in the one-run ball games, in pivotal moments, that can show up,” says Kiermaier.
“We were able to expose other teams many times when they made mistakes. Being on this team now, you give us an extra out, we can beat you with the bat or whatever. I always think there’s some give and take when it comes to stuff like that. But they’re not doing anything over there that other teams don’t know about. They live off pitching and defence and just hit enough and their numbers speak for themselves. But they’re coming here and they’re playing a really good Toronto Blue Jays team and I’m excited to compete.”
Kiermarier has been a big part of his new team’s start, helping to transform the outfield defence with his play in centre, disrupting on the basepaths and, as a bonus, contributing with the bat, as well. At .351/.351/.541, his current production at the plate is sure to ebb, but it’s the wide array of tools he offers up that is of wider importance to the Blue Jays, who sought this winter to diversify their offence and have seen some early returns in that regard.
A prime example came in Wednesday’s 4-3, 10-inning comeback win over the Detroit Tigers, when they scratched out a pair of runs on sacrifice flies by Whit Merrifield and Alejandro Kirk in the ninth before a perfect Kiermaier sacrifice bunt set up George Springer’s RBI single through a drawn-in infield in the 10th.
“That’s us utilizing our roster and showing the ability to beat you in different ways, not just relying on the homers,” says Kiermaier. “Sacrifice flies, sacrifice bunt here and there, using our speed, our power, using our personnel and everybody’s skill sets to our advantage. Guys one through nine, we all provide a certain skill set and we complement each other really well. Top of the order, those guys can flat out hit and give them five at-bats a game, it’s unfair for the opposition. I’m so glad I’m on a team where we have all these great guys.”
Along with Daulton Varsho and trade deadline addition Merrifield, the Blue Jays now have some dynamic elements they can mix into a game and Kiermaier’s early return to form after two years of hip issues has been essential. Appearing in 10 of the team’s 13 games so far, is “maybe a tick better than what we expected,” says Schneider.
“For a guy that a big part of his game is speed, athleticism, it’s a pretty big deal for him to be where he is physically,” the manager continues. “It’s a testament to the work that he did in the off-season. We were careful in spring training a little bit but he he’s ready to go. He’s coming in feeling good every day, knock on wood, so it’s in a really good spot.”
In not having to protect his body as much, Kiermaier is also able to put in more work before games now to, as “last year I never went out and threw or ran sprints.” Doing that “translates in the way I move out there and it’s been great.”
“I feel like I’m bouncing back, being able to go out there and put the product on the field that I’ve been used to,” he adds. “It just wasn’t there the last couple of years, especially last year. I just didn’t have a labrum to work with and played through it. Now I’ve got some structure, some stability in here and that’s helping me with so many things. I always deal with a chronic sore back and I still get these things here or there. But when you’re overcompensating for not having a very important part of your body and other things are working twice as hard, the body just gets locked up in so many different places. Now, I’m not going to have a perfect body by any means, but it’s the best body that I’ve had in a couple of years and I just want to keep it that way, be able to run around and move around and be excited to work on my game every day.”
This weekend against the Rays, he’ll aim to remind them of what they’re missing.
