Another blow for rotation as rookie star Trey Yesavage headed to IL

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Yesavage, Jose Berrios and Shane Bieber are all slated to start the season on the injured list.

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Published Mar 19, 2026  •  Last updated 1 hour ago  •  4 minute read

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Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Trey Yesavage talks about his pitches at Spring Training in Dunedin, Fla., Friday, Feb. 13, 2026. Photo by Frank Gunn /THE CANADIAN PRESSArticle content

DUNEDIN, Fla. — From rookie sensation to the injured list, a wounded Trey Yesavage is the latest blow to Blue Jays pitching plans.

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And just like that, what was shaping up as an area of extreme depth for the reigning American League champions is suddenly thinned out considerably.

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The grim news was revealed by Toronto manager John Schneider on Thursday as he announced that Yesavage will begin the season recovering from what the team is describing as right shoulder impingement.

The announcement isn’t a huge surprise given some of the struggles and careful handling of Yesavage here at Spring Training, but a setback nonetheless. The development also exposes the team playing loose with the truth with the status of the prized rookie’s health status over the past week.

Yesavage had been babied along this spring and had yet to throw in an official Grapefruit League contest. As well, at least two teammates had noted that the 22-year-old’s velocity has been lagging. It was clear with Thursday’s announcement, however, that there have been concerns about Yesavage’s status for weeks.

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“Obviously (the condition) led to his slow build up,” Schneider said. “He’s feeling good, so he’ll be able to continue on the program he’s on, but will open the season on the IL.

“We had a plan to kind of slow play it anyway after last year and then wanted to get over that hump initially and did.”

Without Yesavage at his best, the Jays didn’t want to force the issue and will back off, keeping off the mound until the middle of next week.

“We’ll see how he progressed. He doesn’t have to stop throwing or anything,” Schneider said.

What is an impingement?

On yet another day when Schneider was asked to play doctor, he said the biggest difficulty with the injury is that it affects Yesavage’s range of motion. Obviously that both limits his effectiveness and his velocity.

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“It’s not a strain or anything like that,” Schneider said. “Just not fully functional. So now that we’ve kind of knocked that out, just continue to ramp up. That’s behind him now. It’s just about making sure he’s in a good spot medically, physically, to be in the best spot he can be.

“A lot of guys deal with this and when he reported (to camp) then it was ‘okay, let’s slow play this a little bit.’”

Schneider said that the condition should heal with rest and treatment, which is why the team isn’t worried that Yesavage will be sidelined for any length of time.

The team’s revelation of the injury setback also explains some of our conversations with Yesavage over the previous week. While polite, the young right hander was uncharacteristically brief in his comments, several times saying he was approaching his status as “day by day.”

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What were the signs of trouble?

From the start of camp there were certainly concerns, though from Schneider, to pitching coach Pete Walker to Yesavage himself, there were certainly some warning signs.

First off, the fact that he only pitched in a game last week – and even that was a simulated minor league contest in which he didn’t finish either of the two innings he started and allowed a pair of home runs. Then there was the velocity concerns, from those who saw him in action.

“If he was throwing 95 or 96 (miles per hour) right now, I think we’d be having a different conversation,” told the Toronto Sun after Yesavage’s most recent outing on Monday. “But the fact that he was not built up to that … he’s a potential superstar so of course they’re going to try to do every little thing to make sure he’s able to perform at his best.”

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On Wednesday during an appearance on the Foul Territory podcast, fellow Jays starter Kevin Gausman noted that Yesavage’s arm “wasn’t bouncing back the way he wanted.”

What’s next for the thinned out rotation?

Hello, Eric Lauer, basically.

With Yesavage, Jose Berrios and Shane Bieber all slated to start the season on the injured list, Lauer looks like a lock to handle the fifth spot in the rotation when the season gets under way next week.

The Jays were well aware that they would need starting pitching depth and the emergence of Max Scherzer’s terrific work this spring may end up being a god send.

“It’s why you kind of build up everyone that you have available for that rotation spot,” Schneider said. “A month ago we were talking about all the starter’s we have and baseball has a way of working itself out.

“You just want to see who is the best fit for those times. But we’re comfortable with all those guys as starters.”

As it stands heading into the final weekend of spring training, the Jays rotation shapes up as: opening day starter Gausman followed by some combination of Dylan Cease, Max Scherzer, Cody Ponce and Lauer.

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