Blue Jays: Rankings are just a number for Nate Pearson

Nate Pearson may not be as highly regarded as a prospect these days, but his falling ranking shouldn’t matter to him or the Blue Jays.

Earlier this week we learned that Pearson had fallen to #73 on Baseball Prospectus’ latest rankings, which is quite a difference from what used to be a pretty universal top 10 ranking among these kind of lists. A lot has happened since he was regarded near the top of the heap among minor leaguers, and most of it has been lost time due to injury for the now 25 year old.

Unfortunately he’s only managed to throw 33.0 innings in the big leagues over the last two seasons, including 12 appearances late last season that covered 15.0 frames. Pearson worked in relief last season after spending most of the year working back from a variety of injuries, and the hope is that he’ll enter Spring Training fully healthy and be able to stay that way throughout 2022. As far as injury luck goes, he’s due for things to swing his way at some point.

While it’s disappointing to see his stock falling, Blue Jays fans need to take that number with a grain of salt, just as I’m sure Pearson and the Blue Jays will be doing. At this point very little has changed as far as the abilities that had the Florida native viewed as one of the most exciting young arms in baseball. He still throws a triple digit fastball, and he’s working on some secondary pitches with a great deal of potential. Unfortunately he hasn’t been able to make the developmental gains that we’d hope to see over the last two seasons, but again, that’s largely been because of a lack of time spent on the mound.

The reason that Pearson has fallen on those lists is quite simple, and it all boils down to his recent injury history. The ability to stay healthy is an important factor that teams look for to build their rosters, especially from younger players like Pearson. It’s all the more pronounced as a potential starting pitcher, and someone that the Blue Jays had hoped would be established in the rotation by now. Instead he’s been long passed by Alek Manoah as far as the bright young starters in the organization, although the hope remains that the two could form a dynamic duo of youngsters to join the veterans at the top.

For Pearson the 2022 season will be all about three things. First, he needs to finally stay healthy for a full season, both in order to further development his skill set, and to find a way to contribute to the big league roster. Secondly, he needs to continue that development, specifically with his fastball command. Last but not least will be opportunity, and there’s no guarantee that Pearson will be handed a rotation job to start the year even if he’s healthy. With Jose Berrios, Kevin Gausman, Hyun Jin Ryu and Manoah filling the top four spots, Pearson could be in for a battle for the fifth starter’s job. That could be with internal candidates like Ross Stripling, Thomas Hatch, Anthony Kay and more, or with a yet to be acquired veteran.

At the end of the day, all prospect rankings are really good for is to give us an idea around the potential of a player. We already know that Pearson has the talent to be an ace-level performer in the big leagues, whether he’s still considered as a top 10 prospect or not. For Pearson the battle will be staying healthy enough to work toward reaching that potential, and if he can do that, we’ll all quickly forget that he was even still talked about as a prospect over the winter.