Blue Jays Player of the Week – Edwin Encarnacion Repeats

Overall, the Blue Jays played well this past week but wins did not come easily. They scored 36 runs and allowed 26, but still ended up with a 3-4 record. They’ve been playing the kind of baseball that it takes to win but have been falling just shy. They haven’t been making mental miscues or bungled things up in the field and the starters have improved. If they can keep doing what they did this past week, wins should start coming in bunches.

Offensively, Chris Colabello, Edwin Encarnacion and Ryan Goins (? yup) led the way. They had 1.133, 1.108 and 1.066 OPS respectively. Colabello hit 2 HRs, 2 doubles and added 6 BBs. Encarnacion clubbed 3 loud homers, added a double and walked 5 times. Goins had a HR, 2 doubles and 4 walks. 

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The starters this week, except for fill-in Todd Redmond, all went 6 innings which was very encouraging. Dickey threw a complete game allowing 4 earned and just 7 walks/hits. Buehrle threw 7.1 innings and allowed 3 earned with 8 walks/hits. Hutchison had very poor luck with the bullpen blowing things behind him in his start and deserved better than the 4 earned runs he was charged with. Aaron Sanchez had two very good outings. He allowed 5 earned over 14 innings, had 18 walks/hits and struck out 9.

The bullpen performed well this week aside from Steve Delabar blowing Hutchison’s start. They had a WHIP of 0.93, 10.80 K/9, 1.2 BB/9 and a 2.88 FIP. Liam Hendriks and Roberto Osuna were the leaders of the pack. Hendriks threw 3 innings, struck out 5, 0 ER and allowed just a walk and a hit. Osuna pitched 3.1 IP, allowed one baserunner and struck out 3.

As solid as the pitching was this week, no one pitcher did quite enough to match the contributions of an everyday hitter (as is usually the case). Chris Colabello got it done with the bat but was terrible in the field making two glaring and costly errors. This week it came down to Edwin Encarnacion and Ryan Goins. Encarnacion had the bigger hits but Goins obviously wins out defensively. Goins had 0.224 WPA and a 2.71 RE24. Encarncion nearly doubled those totals with 0.449 WPA and 5.52 RE24. As good as Goins defence is, it can’t make up that kind of difference. PoW is Edwin Encarnacion for the second straight week.

Encouragingly, there weren’t many good candidates for the Razzie. Ryan Tepera allowed 2 earned in 2.1 IP, Steve Delabar had 0 earned but blew Hutchison’s start and Pillar had a very poor week at the plate. We’ll give the Razzie to Delabar.

Next: Blue Jays Pitching This Past Week