TORONTO \u2014 Spencer Arrighetti watched in 2024. He was scheduled to start Game 3 for the Houston Astros in the wild-card round that year, but the game never arrived. The right-hander was stuck spectating from the bullpen as the Astros dropped the first two games to the Detroit Tigers and their season ended. He hasn\u2019t had a crack at October since.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s honestly shaped my ideas of late-season stuff as a player,\u201d Arrighetti said. \u201cI never want to be the guy that\u2019s just sitting in the bullpen watching ever again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Arrighetti, acquired for outfielder Daulton Varsho at the deadline, isn\u2019t the ace of this Blue Jays staff. He\u2019s not throwing 94 miles per hour as he was in 2024 or dealing in September as he did for Houston that year. Right now, with the Blue Jays\u2019 rotation half empty, Arrighetti will help determine if he and the Jays can get back to the postseason.<\/p>\n
\u201cHaving been there once,\u201d Arrighetti said, \u201cit makes me more excited, more hungry to get back there. And, really, everything I\u2019m doing right now is trying to help this team be in that same spot.\u201d<\/p>\n
The 26-year-old delivered his best outing as a Jay on Saturday, twirling 2 2\/3 innings with one unearned run allowed in Toronto\u2019s 7-3 win over the Baltimore Orioles. With the Cleveland Guardians\u2019 loss to the Minnesota Twins, Toronto is one game out of the American League\u2019s final wild-card spot.<\/p>\n
Cast your vote for AL Cy Young<\/p>\n
Joe Crisalli<\/p>\n
It was a modest bulk relief appearance, not the sort of brilliant start Arrighetti delivered down the stretch in 2024. That year, the righty allowed just six earned runs in his final four outings (20 innings pitched) to help the Astros win a division title. Right now, though, the Jays don\u2019t need six innings of dominance. They just need stability.<\/p>\n
Dylan Cease and Jos\u00e9 Soriano are the undisputed big dogs in the rotation. The Jays have Max Scherzer, who has a chance to turn back the clock every time he steps on a mound, and Trey Yesavage (knee) and Shane Bieber (shoulder) potentially coming off the injured list. They seem to, for now, have enough pitching to survive in October. They just need a few good outings to get them there. With the mess that is the AL playoff race, some solid bulk relief from Arrighetti could be enough. He knows it.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m whatever they want me to be,\u201d Arrighetti said. \u201cAll that matters right now is winning, especially with where we\u2019re at in the standings. I have absolutely no ego about this.\u201d<\/p>\n
Arrighetti\u2019s outing Saturday dropped his ERA with the Jays to 6.87. In the first four appearances Arrighetti made with the Blue Jays before Saturday, they lost by a combined 23 runs. It hasn\u2019t gone great since Arrighetti returned from a foot issue, but he\u2019s been effective before. That\u2019s why the Jays acquired him, though they certainly didn\u2019t realize Bieber, Yesavage and Jameson Taillon would get hurt right after the deadline, thrusting Arrighetti into a key role.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s why I\u2019ve been so obsessive about the mechanics part and so obsessive about the usage and about execution,\u201d Arrighetti said. \u201cI truly know that there is a very, very good big leaguer here, but there\u2019s versions of myself that aren\u2019t competitive.\u201d<\/p>\n
The key, manager John Schneider said, is his fastball command. Arrighetti leans on his curveball and four-seamer but throws up to five other pitches at times. If he can keep the fastball away from the middle of the zone, as he did Saturday, it allows his off-speed and breaking stuff to earn the chase.<\/p>\n
Long term, with three years of club control remaining after 2026, Arrighetti will be a starting pitcher for the Jays. Right now, though, eating innings from the bullpen may be best for a team amid a race to October. Pitching in relief allows Arrighetti, he said, to focus on the weapons required for the lane of hitters he\u2019ll face. He throws his \u201cPlan A\u201d and \u201cPlan B\u201d pitches while warming up in the bullpen for the first few batters he\u2019ll face. When he\u2019s on the mound warming up for the next inning, the righty practices pitches for the next set of batters.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s about executing in small pockets, for a short period of time. Then, if they\u2019re winning, the Jays can turn to their leverage relievers. It seems like a simple plan, but if Arrighetti or any other reliever stumbles, bullpen days can turn into chaos and clear losses. The Jays can\u2019t afford many of those obvious defeats right now.<\/p>\n
Arrighetti entered in the fourth inning Saturday and held the Jays\u2019 lead. Scoring seven runs makes Toronto\u2019s pitching puzzle a whole lot easier, but so does Arrighetti\u2019s eating up eight outs for a team set to trot out bullpen games for the rest of the season. It doesn\u2019t have to be pretty. It doesn\u2019t have to be five or six innings. Still, if it helps the Jays win, that\u2019s all that matters right now. Even in bulk relief, Arrighetti is crucial to Toronto\u2019s October hopes.<\/p>\n
\u201cBeing involved in winning is way cooler than being involved in losing,\u201d Arrighetti said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO \u2014 Spencer Arrighetti watched in 2024. He was scheduled to start Game 3 for the Houston Astros…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":890862,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,591,85,5161],"class_list":["post-890861","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-mlb","tag-sports","tag-toronto-blue-jays"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/890861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=890861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/890861\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/890862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=890861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=890861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=890861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}