Blue Jays: Sanchez returns to the DL for the 3rd time

The Blue Jays just can’t catch a break this season when it comes to injuries, and especially when it comes to the 2016 AL ERA leader in Aaron Sanchez, who hit the DL for the 3rd time already this season.

After having a season that exceeded everyone’s expectations in 2016, very little has gone right this year for Aaron Sanchez. The Blue Jays announced on Saturday that the talented right-hander was placed on the DL for the 3rd time already in the young season, with reoccurring issues on his pitching hand.

The native Californian hit the DL for the first time this season while dealing with blister issues on the middle finger of his pitching hand. After the minimum time spent on the sidelines, the star hurler returned, only to throw just a single inning before leaving again on April 30th, and hitting the DL for the second time. This time, the culprit was a split nail on the same finger, and the thought was Sanchez could spend the minimum amount of time on the DL before resuming his place in the rotation.

Fast forward to Saturday, and he’s been placed on the DL for the 3rd time already, this time with issues around the middle finger on his pitching hand again. This time it’s being called a “middle linger laceration”.

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He’s eligible to return again on May 30th, so it will likely be another short stay on the disabled list for Sanchez, but another frustrating trip regardless. In his last start he looked pretty good overall, throwing 6 innings and allowed 3 earned runs on 6 hits, 2 walks and he also picked up 4 strikeouts, all while hitting up to 97 on the radar gun.

Despite all of those encouraging signs, the 24 year old is still dealing with some pain in the finger, enough that the Blue Jays felt it was necessary to shut him down…. again.

When asked about the situation by the Toronto Star, John Gibbons reiterated what we’ve heard a couple times this year, and hopefully this third trip to the DL will finally solve the lingering issues for Sanchez.

“We want to knock it out. It’s aggravating him. If we don’t get rid of it, then it’ll probably linger forever.”- John Gibbons

So with that in mind, hopefully Sanchez can finally put the whole thing behind him when he returns from the DL at the end of May (assuming he misses the minimum amount of time again.

Blister and nail issues can be tricky, as we’ve seen with Sanchez’s case this season. The team has tried rest, a minor surgical procedure, and other therapies, and still the problem persists.

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Gibbons indicated that rest is the likely cure at this point, so hopefully with this trip to the DL, the third time is finally the charm.