3 Blue Jays starts that feel sustainable, 2 that feel like fool’s gold

Fool’s Gold – George Springers silly OBP

That's right, George Springer's on-base percentage is .520!

While nobody expects him to get on base in every other at bat for the rest of the season, Springer’s hot start has been a pleasant surprise. However, there are some underlying stats that hint at his OBP coming down hard over the next few weeks. First off, he’s tied with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. for the team lead in strikeouts (eight). While it hopefully won’t remain that high all season, it will deter him from keeping up his torrid on-base pace.

He’s also gotten lucky in some of his at-bats. So far his weighted on base average on breaking balls is .532, and .418 on off-speed pitches, but his expected WOBA sits at .311 on breaking balls and .365 on off-speed pitches.

Still, FanGraphs has him projected at a .324 OBP in 2025 – up from his .303 mark from a year ago.   

Sustainable – Alan Roden and Will Wagner combining for a 5.0 fWAR

The two left-handed hitting rookies have shown through the early part of the season that they’ve got the bat-to-ball skills to hang in the bigs – and they could end up providing a huge surplus of value to this team by seasons end. Through the first week of games, Roden (0.1) and Wagner (0.2) have combined for 0.3 fWAR. They've both hit over .300.

Prior to the start of the season, Roden was projected by FanGraphs to have a 1.5 fWAR and Wagner was projected to have 2.0.

However, they are both surpassing their expectations and it’s not inconceivable to think that they could be worth one or two more WAR before the season's over

Last year, Marcell Ozuna was worth 4.7 fWAR, Willy Adames was worth 4.8 fWAR, Brent Rooker posted a 5.1 fWAR and Bryce Harper was at 5.2. That’s the type of production these two Blue Jays are currently on pace to combine for in their first full season in Toronto.