Max Scherzer's spring debut featured a little bit of everything

It took all of two pitches for Max Scherzer to have some excitement behind him.

After opening Tuesday's spring training game with a ball inside to Victor Scott II, Scherzer left a fastball inside that Scott mashed to dead center that glanced off Joey Loperfido's glove and resulted in Loperfido smacking his head into the outfield wall.

While that was a subpar start for Scherzer and the Blue Jays, the future Hall of Famer locked in and recorded four strikeouts over two innings of work in his Blue Jays debut — a promising sign when it comes to the strength of the Blue Jays' rotation.

Max Scherzer pitches well in spring debut

Scott's aforementioned triple was the lone hit allowed by Scherzer over his two innings of work. He threw 34 pitches: 17 fastballs, six sliders, four changeups, four curveballs and three cutters. His fastball sat around 92 mph and he generated three whiffs with it.

He also had two whiffs with the slider and changeup and one with his curveball.

After he gave up a sacrifice fly to Alex Burleson, he got Lars Nootbaar and Nolan Gorman to strikeout before generating one fly out (Pedro Pagés) and two strikeouts (Thomas Saggese and JJ Wetherholt) in the second inning. He threw 34 pitches and 20 of them were strikes.

He was then relieved by Bowden Francis, who was supposed to start Monday before the Blue Jays' game was canceled due to rain. Francis got José Fermín and Nathan Church to pop out before Scott tagged him for a solo home run on a fastball that got too much of the plate.

Francis went two innings in his spring debut and allowed one run (the home run) in 27 pitches. He threw 13 fastballs, eight sliders, five splitters and a curveball. His fastball maxed out at 95 mph, and he was able to generate four called strikes with it. He generated his lone whiff on his slider.

Outside of Scott's two at-bats, Francis and Scherzer looked great in their spring debuts, which is good news considering they'll likely make up 40% of the Blue Jays' rotation in the regular season.

It remains to be seen how bad Loperfido's injury is, but Toronto has plenty of depth in the outfield in the case of an injury.

Steward Berroa entered the game in relief for Loperfido, and could be in for more playing time if Loperfido has to miss any time.

Toronto ended up winning 3-2 thanks to Michael Stefanic's go-ahead single in the bottom of the sixth inning.