Blue Jays must end the Joe Biagini experiment

The Toronto Blue Jays need to stop experimenting with Joe Biagini as a starting pitcher and accept the fact that if the hurler is going to succeed at the major league level it is going to be in a relief role.

Joe Biagini has done nothing in his 12 starts this season to indicate that he has anything to offer in a starting role, the fact of the matter is Biagini has proven that he cannot be relied upon to fill one of the five spots next season and the Jays should not rely on him to do so and move on from that very notion.

Biagini was a feel good story last season after being plucked from the San Francisco Giants in the Rule 5 draft. The 27-year old performed well out of the pen and proved that he deserved to be in the majors. After starting 90 games in the minor prior to joining the Jays, the brain trust figured he deserved a shot and rightly so.

However, in his 12 starts this season Biagini has surrendered 39 earned runs and that is after his first two starts were scoreless outings while on strict pitch counts. He has only pitched into the sixth inning on three of those twelve occasions.

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Biagini owns a 3-9 record with a 5.40 earned run average surrendering 54 earned runs in 90 innings of work this season. A far cry from the 3.06 earned run average he provided in high leverage situations out of the bullpen.

Understandably it is no doubt difficult to flip flop back and forth from the bullpen to a starting role but the Jays need to just accept the fact that the “Genie in a bottle” is more valuable as a trustworthy reliever late in games than a subpar fifth starter in the rotation. The Jays have utilized 13 different starting pitchers this season so they had no choice but to see what the big right-hander had to offer.

Next: Blue Jays: Is it time to change gears?

You tried it, it didn’t work now let’s move on from the “Biagini Experiment” and look to someone else to fill the two vacant rotation spots in 2018. Don’t get me wrong, I love me some Biagini but it just has to be out of the bullpen.