Blue Jays: Jordan Romano’s remarkable post-injury stats in 2021

On Monday we learned that Jordan Romano finished the 2021 season with a knee injury, and the production he gave the Blue Jays is all the more impressive.

According to Rob Longley’s article in the Toronto Sun, Romano was diagnosed with a torn meniscus in his left knee after the regular season had concluded. It doesn’t sound like Romano or the Blue Jays are certain of when the injury happened, but the 28 year old closer pointed to a play that happened in their first game back at the Rogers Centre, which came on July 30th.

Assuming he’s correct, and we have no reason to really doubt that he is, that means that Romano made another 25 appearances for the Blue Jays while dealing with the knee injury. That gutsy performance turned out to be absolutely massive as the Blue Jays closed the gap on the American League Wild Card race, missing the postseason by just one game while finishing with 91 wins.

As Romano describes it, the injury had a significant impact on how he goes about his business:

"“It was my left knee and that’s huge because it’s my landing knee and that’s where you get a lot of your velocity being able to stop your body. It’s really important. We worked hard on just getting it stable enough to be able to throw on it for the rest of the season.”"

That all makes sense to me. What doesn’t make sense is that Romano somehow managed to pitch even better on one leg.

In the month of August and with a pretty fresh injury, Romano posted an ERA of 1.42 and a WHIP of 1.026 over 12.2 innings pitched. Despite having to navigate around the knee issues, batters slashed just .217/.265/.391 against the Canadian fireballer. As if that wasn’t impressive enough, Romano was even better down the stretch in September/October as he had a 1.93 ERA with a 0.714 WHIP as opponents slashed just .104/.204/.229 over 14 innings of work.

I can’t help but think about how big of a blow it would have been to the Blue Jays if Romano had hit the Injured List at the time as well. On July 30 the Blue Jays were 52-48, just four games over .500. By the time the season ended they were 20 games above .500, finishing 91-71. That 39-23 finish to the year doesn’t happen without Romano’s contribution, especially because he was one of the few reliable faces of the shakiest part of the roster.

The good news is that the Markham, Ontarive native reports that he’s feeling great after finally dealing with the knee injury by having offseason surgery. According to Longley’s article the right-hander said, “Now we’re six weeks out and it feels like a brand new knee.”

For a late-inning reliever that relies on an elite fastball-slider combination, being able to fully commit with his body will go a long way toward another successful season in 2022. I can’t help but feel encouraged that Romano was able to perform that well even when he wasn’t at 100%, and it’s hard not to be excited about what next season will bring now that he’s healthy.

For all of the trials and tribulations the Blue Jays went through with their bullpen in 2021, in the end it may have been worth it to some degree. That’s because Jordan Romano rose to the top as the closer of the present and the future in Toronto, and it turns out he managed that feat while pitching on one (healthy) leg.