{"id":547295,"date":"2026-03-19T18:37:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T18:37:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/547295\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T18:37:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T18:37:07","slug":"trey-yesavage-to-begin-season-on-injured-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/547295\/","title":{"rendered":"Trey Yesavage To Begin Season On Injured List"},"content":{"rendered":"

Blue Jays righty Trey Yesavage<\/a> will open the 2026 season on the 15-day injured list due to a right shoulder impingement, manager John Schneider announced to the team\u2019s beat (via Arden Zwelling of Sportsnet<\/a>). Yesavage reported to camp with the injury and has been built up slowly as a result. He tossed 35 pitches in a minor league game this week and felt good, but he won\u2019t have enough time to finish ramping up before the season begins. He\u2019ll throw again on March 25, but the Jays are not putting a formal timetable on his potential return.<\/p>\n

Yesavage becomes the third Jays starter ticketed for the IL to begin the season. He\u2019ll join righties Shane Bieber<\/a> (forearm fatigue) and Jos\u00e9 Berr\u00edos<\/a> (right elbow stress fracture) on the shelf. That\u2019ll leave Toronto with a season-opening rotation of Kevin Gausman<\/a>, Dylan Cease<\/a>, Cody Ponce<\/a>, Max Scherzer<\/a> and Eric Lauer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The 22-year-old Yesavage was set to enter the 2026 as one of the favorites for American League Rookie of the Year honors after an eye-opening debut late last year. The former No. 20 overall pick made three regular-season starts and notched a 3.21 ERA in 14 innings before breaking out as a postseason hero. In six playoff appearances (five starts), Yesavage logged a 3.58 ERA, a 35.8% strikeout rate and a 10.1% walk rate.<\/p>\n

Those postseason numbers are a bit skewed from one rough start against the Mariners (five runs in four innings), but Yesavage pushed Toronto into a 3-2 World Series lead when he held the Dodgers\u2019 star-studded lineup to one run over seven frames while piling up a dozen strikeouts at Dodger Stadium. The Jays couldn\u2019t close things out in the final two games back home, but Yesavage\u2019s electric Game 5 performance emphatically thrust him into the national spotlight. He\u2019s still a clear Rookie of the Year candidate, but the shoulder issue clouds those chances a bit. He\u2019ll miss at least a couple starts to begin the year, and we don\u2019t yet have a sense for when Yesavage will rejoin the rotation.<\/p>\n

Despite the slate of injuries, there are some silver linings for the Jays. Toronto has thus far resisted trading any starting pitching despite signing Cease, Ponce and Scherzer \u2014 a trio of signings that pushed them to eight starters for five spots. More importantly, there\u2019s no indication that any of the current injuries are particularly severe. While Bieber\u2019s forearm fatigue and especially Berr\u00edos\u2019 stress fracture sound alarming, the actual prognoses are less troublesome. Bieber is throwing from flat ground and expected to be on a mound soon, Schneider said this morning (via Zwelling<\/a>). Berr\u00edos is symptom-free and only discovered his injury when undergoing a physical for World Baseball Classic purposes. He\u2019s currently expected to resume throwing within a matter of days.<\/p>\n

Though none of the injuries currently point to monthslong absences, the Jays\u2019 depth is already being tested. They can scarcely afford even another minor injury, especially with depth starter Bowden Francis<\/a> out for the year following Tommy John surgery and prospects Ricky Tiedemann<\/a> and Jake Bloss<\/a> still working back from injuries of their own.<\/p>\n

Swingman Yariel Rodr\u00edguez<\/a> could be summoned back to the 40-man roster after previously clearing waivers, but options beyond him are lacking. Righty Lazaro Estrada<\/a> has just 7 1\/3 MLB innings under his belt. Prospect Adam Macko<\/a> and Rule 5 pick Spencer Miles<\/a> have yet to pitch in the majors. Non-roster options beyond Rodriguez include Connor Seabold<\/a> and Michael Plassmeyer<\/a>. Seabold has had a shaky spring and has never found big league success. Plassmeyer is a 29-year-old lefty with 11 major league innings under his belt.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Blue Jays righty Trey Yesavage will open the 2026 season on the 15-day injured list due to a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":547296,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[49,48,82,76366],"class_list":{"0":"post-547295","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-trey-yesavage"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=547295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/547296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=547295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=547295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=547295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}