{"id":554143,"date":"2026-03-22T23:19:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T23:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/554143\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T23:19:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T23:19:08","slug":"tommy-nance-makes-the-opening-day-roster-angel-bastardo-left-off","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/554143\/","title":{"rendered":"Tommy Nance makes the Opening Day roster, Angel Bastardo left off"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the days until Opening Day wind down, so do the available spots on the Toronto Blue Jays<\/a> roster to kick off the 2026 season.A few of those decisions were made public on Sunday afternoon, with John Schneider announcing that Tommy Nance won a spot in the bullpen, and 2024 Rule 5 selection Angel Bastardo has been informed that he will be left off. Yariel Rodr\u00edguez<\/a> and Jorge Alcala, a minor league signee with a Spring Training invite, will also be left off.<\/p>\n

Nance had no remaining minor league options entering Spring Training, so the Blue Jays were cognizant of potentially losing him to another club should Toronto not place him on their Opening Day roster. His 2025 season gave the Blue Jays good reasons to keep him \u2013 Nance posted a 1.99 ERA, 1.01 WHIP, 9.1 K\/9, and no home runs allowed through 30 appearances. He worked his ERA down to 0.82 by the end of August, and because of the reliability he had provided, John Schneider threw him in a save situation during the series opener against the Reds.<\/p>\n

Nance\u2019s curveball was his best pitch last year, generating<\/a> a 40.9% whiff rate and just a .159 opponents\u2019 batting average. His sinker and slider, however, were both hit pretty well by opposing hitters, including expected batting averages over .300 for both pitches.<\/p>\n

Bastardo was one of the several storylines heading into Blue Jays camp in the spring.<\/p>\n

A Rule 5 selection in 2024, he missed most of the \u201924 and all of the \u201925 campaigns recovering from Tommy John surgery. Through seven appearances this spring, Bastardo allowed four earned runs over 7 2\/3 innings, including seven walks and five strikeouts.<\/p>\n

Arden Zwelling of Sportsnet broke down the details of Bastardo\u2019s situation very cleanly on his above X post. Since Bastardo was a Rule 5 pick, he will be placed on waivers for other teams to claim. Should he go unclaimed, he will be offered back to the Red Sox at a $50,000 cost. If the Red Sox aren\u2019t interested, Bastardo could be sent to Toronto\u2019s minor league system. Per Zwelling, there are also scenarios where the Blue Jays could trade him to another organization as a Rule 5 pick, or they could also work out a deal with the Red Sox to acquire him.<\/p>\n

To make a long story short, the Bastardo\u2019s stint with the Blue Jays may not be over just yet. Still just 23 years of age, Bastrado has not appeared in a level north of double-A; an organization will surely take a chance on him somewhere.<\/p>\n

Nance\u2019s spot being announced leaves just one more vacancy in Toronto\u2019s bullpen. Candidates remaining include lefty Adam Macko, Chase Lee, and Spencer Miles, Toronto\u2019s Rule 5 pick last season. They could also fill this spot with an external addition should the opportunity present itself. Mitch Bannon of The Athletic reported that Schneider will make this decision<\/a> tomorrow morning.CHECK OUT OFF THE ROSTER \u2013 NEW EPISODES EVERY WEEKDAY\"\"<\/a>Off The Roster is Toronto sports. Hosted by Cabbie Richards, Lindsay Dunn, and Dan Riccio, this is the go-to morning conversation for everything happening in the 6ix \u2013 Hockey, Baseball, Basketball and everything in between. From breakout performances and questionable trades to throwback jerseys, viral moments, and the stories fans are actually talking about\u2014it\u2019s smart, sharp, and never scripted. Live weekday mornings on the Nation Network YouTube channel<\/a> and available wherever you stream podcasts, the show delivers real opinions, real chemistry, and real Toronto energy. Missed an episode? Catch up anytime. Off The Roster\u2014The new sound of the 6ix.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the days until Opening Day wind down, so do the available spots on the Toronto Blue Jays…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":554144,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194291],"tags":[49,48,3302],"class_list":["post-554143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-toronto","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-toronto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554143","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=554143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554143\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/554144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=554143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=554143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=554143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}