Blue Jays: An early guess at how the 26-man roster will look

The lineup

If there’s one area of the Blue Jays roster that’s going to strike fear into their opponents, it’s the lineup.

The Jays already had an exciting young lineup coming together with the likes of Bo Bichette, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Teoscar Hernandez, Lourdes Gurriel Jr., Cavan Biggio, and more, and then they went out and added two All-Stars to the mix in Springer and Semien. It’s hard to say how the final lineup configuration will look, and chances are it’ll change several times throughout the year, but I’m guessing that Charlie Montoyo will at least start things off with something like this:

1- Springer (CF)
2- Semien (2B)
3- Bichette (SS)
4- Hernandez (RF)
5- Biggio (3B)
6- Gurriel Jr. (LF)
7- Vlad Jr. (1B)
8- Rowdy Tellez (DH)
9- Danny Jansen (C)

You could honestly flip this lineup around in a number of different ways, and the answer would be just as promising. I could see Semien moving down later in the year, but I have a feeling that Montoyo will lead off with his two new additions, and it’s not exactly a bad strategy. Springer has been one of the best lead-off men in baseball for a number of years, and Semien was an MVP candidate as recently as 2019.

That said, Biggio works well as either a lead-off hitter, or even in the two-spot, and I suspect that we’re about to see a big year from Vlad Jr. as well, and an inevitable move up in the order. It’s a good problem for Montoyo to deal with, and it may be as simple as filling out his lineup card according to match-ups, or even who has been hot at the plate.

There may be a few weaknesses left on the Blue Jays roster, but hitting shouldn’t be one of them. Expect this team to score a lot of runs.