Blue Jays: Who has had the worst season as a Blue Jay in 2019?

There are good reasons for the Blue Jays’ struggles this season, and it starts with some pretty poor individual performances. Who are the worst offenders?

It takes more than one or two players struggling to put a team at a record of 26-46, and there’s no doubt that’s been the case for the Blue Jays this season.

There have been positive contributions and players quietly having solid seasons like Marcus Stroman, Justin Smoak, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and a few others, but overall it’s been a disappointing start to the 2019 campaign, even if the Blue Jays were expected to take some lumps in the first real year of their rebuild.

To be fair, the roster has struggled with injuries so far this year, especially in the starting rotation. They’ve had pitchers like Ryan Borucki, Clayton Richard, Clay Buchholz and Matt Shoemaker miss most or all of the season, and that’s just in the rotation. Ken Giles recently hit the sidelines just as the Blue Jays were getting David Phelps back, and we have yet to see Devon Travis on the field this year.

Sadly, we could make a long list of players that have disappointed so far this season, but looking at the entire list might be a little too depressing. Instead, let’s have a look at which individuals have had the roughest go of things in a Blue Jays’ jersey this season, and ultimately find out:

Who has had the worst season in 2019 so far?

Aaron Sanchez

I’m not suggesting that Aaron Sanchez has been the worst player on the Blue Jays’ roster, but I felt like including him in my top-five list. His has been one of the “worst” seasons for the Blue Jays for a few different reasons other than his underperformance.

Once again, Sanchez has struggled with familiar issues with his pitching hand. Last season it was a variety of blisters, fingernail issues, and eventually tendon problems that sidelined him for half of the campaign, and after he’d only made eight starts in 2017. This season he’s had blister and fingernail problems again, but thankfully they haven’t forced him to the injured list, at least not yet.

I would think that they’re at least partially to blame for his disappointing performance overall though, as he’s looked to avoid the recurring issue and hasn’t been able to focus solely on pitching. The right-hander is well aware that he’s going to be a free agent after the 2020 season and will need to re-establish his reputation from back when he led the AL in ERA in 2016, but so far he’s done anything but that this year.

He’s currently carrying a record of 3-8 with a 5.04 ERA and a 1.600 WHIP through 15 starts and 75 innings pitched. That’s hardly what the Blue Jays were hoping for in order to help their team in this season, but it also doesn’t help his value on the trade market, where he’s expected to end up this summer as the Blue Jays continue their rebuild.

I’ve always believed in his talent and his upside, but it’s getting harder to buy in to the idea that he’ll ever be able to reclaim the potential he showed a few years ago. For that frustrating reason, I included him on this list, although I acknowledge he’s far from the worst offender.

Danny Jansen

I feel bad including the first-year catcher on this list, but putting him just after Sanchez and before what’s to come makes me feel a little better. I’ll start by saying he’s been a solid defender, rating at 0.6 dWAR according to baseballreference.com, but it’s been at the plate where he’s struggled to make a consistent contribution.

It’s common for catchers to struggle a bit with the bat when they are getting used to the demands of the big leagues and the increased focus on video and scouting reports, but Jansen won’t be able to use that excuse forever. He’s currently slashing .175/.257/.250 across 160 at-bats, chipping in two home runs, 14 RBI, and six doubles and an overall bWAR rating of -0.2.

We know that he’s capable of more, as he performed well at the various minor league stops before becoming a Blue Jay, and he also hit .247/.347/.432 in 95 plate appearances last year, and those are closer to the type of numbers the club would like to see from Jansen. He shouldn’t have to be an offensive star in the future with the likes of Guerrero Jr., Cavan Biggio, Bo Bichette, Lourdes Gurriel Jr. and more, but hitting below the Mendoza line isn’t going to cut it.

For now, it’s acceptable because he’s a rookie who is still adjusting to the league with a defence-first job, but if he can’t get things going by some time early in the second half then don’t be surprised to see someone like Reese McGuire get another opportunity at the highest level. I have confidence that Jansen will find his stroke, but so far he’s been having a lot tougher time standing at the dish than squatting behind it.

Teoscar Hernandez

Now we’re really getting into the territory of real disappointment, at least in terms of what we were hoping to see in 2019 from some of the Blue Jay starters.

Teoscar Hernandez was more or less handed the everyday role in left field, and after spending a good chunk of his offseason working on his defensive play in winter ball, he looked like he was going to be able to lock down the job.

Except that instead of struggling in the outfield, now he couldn’t hit enough to keep himself in the lineup.

He was hitting .189/.262/.299 when he was demoted to Buffalo on May 15th, but he’s been a little better since being recalled on June 5th. Oddly enough, he’s been playing centre field for the most part and doing a reasonable job of it, but he also had to leave Monday’s game with a reported wrist sprain after crashing into the outfield wall.

The reason I include Hernandez on this list is because this was the season he was supposed to grab a job in this lineup for the foreseeable future. Last year the question wasn’t so much about whether he could hit enough to contribute, but whether he was capable of covering an outfield corner well enough to justify having him in the lineup as a long-term piece. Now I’m really not sure how he’s going to fit in with this rebuild, even if he’s been a lineup regular lately.

As long as his injury from last night isn’t serious, I would suspect that Hernandez will get ample opportunity throughout the rest of this season, and hopefully he’ll be able to put the rough start behind him. So far he’s been worth -0.2 according to baseballreference.com, and -0.3 as a defender. That said, he’s shown the ability to be an asset as a hitter in the past, and the Jays will hope he can find that form again before the opportunity in Toronto passes him by.

Edwin Jackson

Last but not least, the title for the worst season as a Blue Jay has to go to Edwin Jackson, who was once again pummeled on Monday night in what might be (should be) his last appearance as a Blue Jay.

It’s really been too bad that things are probably going to end this way for the 17-year big league veteran, but I don’t see how the Blue Jays can keep trotting him out to the mound even if they do need arms to fill out their pitching staff. He entered last night’s game with an ERA 10.22 and a WHIP of 2.027(!) in six appearances and just 24.2 innings pitched.

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Those numbers ballooned to 12.43 and 2.290 after he was run off the mound after just 0.2 of an inning, having already surrendered seven runs, with six of them being earned. He gave up back-to-back home runs from Justin Upton and Kole Calhoun, and that wasn’t even all of the damage done in the short outing that further taxed an already tired bullpen, as Mike Trout had a two-run double, and Shohei Ohtani finished off the damage with a three-run blast.

Jackson has been a productive starter throughout his career and was solid as recently as last season when he posted a 3.33 ERA for the Oakland A’s, but it’s pretty clear that he’s just not capable of being a big league starter anymore. The Blue Jays have flat out admitted that they don’t feel they have anyone else capable of taking his spot, but they’ve since acquired Nick Kingham from the Pirates, and surely they’ve got some minor league arms that can pitch a little better than the veteran has performed in 2019.

In a season of really underwhelming individual performances, I have to say that Jackson’s stands out as the worst even though he’s only pitched in seven games. He came into last night’s game with a -1.3 bWAR rating, and it’ll take an even bigger hit when it’s updated sometime later today.

With all due respect to the veteran pitcher, it takes some work to be that bad, and for that reason, I’ll hand him the dubious distinction of the worst season as a Blue Jay in 2019 so far.