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

The Toronto Blue Jays started out the season strong by splitting the four-game series against the Baltimore Orioles, sweeping the Washington Nationals before dropping their series opener against the Mets. Most of those wins came on the back of timely hitting and solid pitching.

Only time will tell if that success will be sustainable for the entire group, but it's not too early to break down some individual performances.

Here, we'll break down three Blue Jays whose starts feel sustainable and two who could crashing down to earth.

Note: All stats are through Friday's games.

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

Sustainable – Bo Bichette’s contact rate

Bichette is hitting .273 with nine hits, two walks and three RBI so far this season. After an injury plagued season in 2024, Bichette is healthy and motivated in the final year of his contract. While he's still looking to find his power stroke (he still has yet to hit a home run, he'd already have one if not for the 14-foot-high wall at Rogers Centre.

Regardless, he’s hitting the ball hard and spreading it around the field. Four of his hits have been to the pull, one has been up the middle and the other four were sent to the opposite field. While his current slash line looks a little lofty, it’s in line with some of his previous productive big-league seasons. FanGraphs has his numbers coming down to .283/.328/.439 – which would still be a very productive year for Bichette, and that’s why this start for Bichette looks to be completely sustainable.

Fool’s Gold – Andrés Giménez’s power surge

As the cleanup hitter in the Toronto line up, Giménez’s slugged his way into the hearts of Blue Jays fans everywhere by hitting three home runs through Toronto's first seven games. Giménez entered the year with less than 50 career home runs, and he didn't hit his third home run last year until May 19. However, we shouldn’t expect Giménez to challenge for Marcus Semien’s record for home runs by a second baseman.

Giménez is making solid contact on 22.7% of the balls he's hit, which is over four times his career average of 5.5%. He’s also hitting fly balls at a rate of 40.9%, which would be his career high by a large margin. FanGraphs projects Giménez to go yard 15 times this year, which would be two off the career-high he set in 2022. That feels much more attainable than his current pace of 69 home runs.

Sustainable – Jeff Homan shutting the door

It took Jeff Hoffman 11 years and stops in four other markets before he recorded a save with the team that originally drafted him. Hoffman pitched a clean 1-2-3 inning against the Orioles on March 30 to record his first save of the season — and his first in a Toronto uniform after the Blue Jays drafted him in 2014.

Hoffman really came into his own as a backend reliever with the Cincinnati Reds in 2022 before putting together two domintant seasons with the Phillies in 2023 and '24. He totaled a 184 ERA+ in those two seasons across 118 2/3 innings with 158 strikeouts.

Hoffman hasn’t lost a step since returning north of the border. He's appeared in four games with Toronto and has recorded 5 strikeouts and three saves. His 11.25 K/9 rate is just above the total that FanGraphs projected (11.09).

He’s also got a 45.5% whiff rate on his splint finger pitch, which is up from his 33.2% from last year.

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.