DUNEDIN, Fla. — The plan entering the off-season for Anthony Santander was to rest, rehab and strengthen the troublesome left shoulder that sank his first season with the Toronto Blue Jays, and the switch-hitting slugger did just that.
Yet when January arrived and he resumed hitting, a pain similar to the one he felt during that fateful crash into an Angel Stadium wall May 8 returned, leading to the decision to undergo last week’s labral repair that will sideline him for five to six months.
The surgery will again cost him most, perhaps all, of a second straight season on the front end of the $92.5-million, five-year contract he signed as a free agent one year ago.
Another extended period of recovery looms.
“It’s not easy to deal with something like this,” he said through interpreter Hector Lebron inside the Player Development Complex clubhouse Wednesday morning, his left arm in an immobilizing sling he must wear around the clock for the next month.
“Coming here to a new team, signing my contract, I want to be there with the guys every day. But unfortunately, things happen that are not under your control. I know some people think differently, but I know who I am. I know I’m trying my best to be on the field with my teammates, and I still have this year and three more years on my contract, so I’m very positive, and I know I’m going to be keep working hard and prepare myself to be ready with my teammates.”
Whether there’s enough runway for that to happen this season is an open question.
The timeline projects out from to mid-July to mid-August and, like last fall when he ramped up, returned for the final week of the regular season and appeared in five post-season games before his back locked up, would require a rushed return in a high-stakes environment.
Far more ideal would have been to have had the surgery at season’s end, but Santander said initial MRIs didn’t reveal the extent of the labral tear in his shoulder, leading he and the Blue Jays to follow the path they did.
“It’s nobody’s fault, it just didn’t show up,” he said. “When they opened it up, they could see that actually I needed (surgery). They didn’t know why the MRI didn’t show how bad it was.”
An MRI “usually paints a pretty good picture,” said manager John Schneider.
“Being someone who’s gone through surgery, not on your shoulder but on your back, you’re never 100 per cent sure what it looks like until you get in. That was kind of the case. … Being in touch with him throughout the off-season, making sure he was good, everything checked out with him and with us.
“Really, we didn’t think it was going to be this outcome. I don’t think anyone thought it was going to be this outcome. That’s the unfortunate part of it.”
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Santander was signed to boost an offence that stagnated in 2024 and while the Blue Jays ranked fourth in runs without him, he was expected to help make up for some of Bo Bichette’s lost production this season. Easily lost given the way his time with the club has started is the type of presence the 2024 all-star offers when healthy.
“It’s a guy that is a proven power threat from both sides of the plate that I think is a great fit for our lineup based on how we can make contact,” said Schneider. “And, it just gives you another way to try to win. I’m doing everything I can to just remember that, remember the years he had against us in Baltimore where he is a legit power threat and that’s what we want him to get back to and just be another complement to our offence.”
To that end, Jesus Sanchez’s acquisition from Houston for Joey Loperfido was aimed at restoring some of the lost power, and the Blue Jays continue to poke around the market looking for other ways to improve.
Santander, meanwhile, is at the start of a rinse-and-repeat he thought was behind him.
“Right when the play happened (that led to the injury), I felt something pinch in the shoulder, but as an athlete, you don’t feel like it’s going be something big,” he said. “I felt at the moment, that I can work through it. I tried. We did everything we could. But obviously it didn’t happen the way we wanted.”
