4 Blue Jays who need to come up big to help carry the team into the playoffs

Matt Chapman

For Matt Chapman, looking back, it certainly looks more and more like April happened to be more of an anomaly than a sign of a potential breakout season for him. After his torrid start to the season, Chapman has certainly fallen back down to earth big time for the rest of the year. Despite still playing solid defence, he really hasn’t come up big for the ballclub since that first month of the season until his game-winning double this past Sunday against the Red Sox to help the Jays finish off the sweep of their divisional rivals.

For the 2023 season, Chapman has hit .246 with a .765 OPS, 62 runs scored, 15 home runs and 51 RBI. However, in his past month and a half, he has posted just a .191 batting average, .542 OPS, with just four runs scored, four doubles, one triple, one home run and seven RBI with 36 strikeouts in just 25 games played prior to Tuesday’s game. He did have an unfortunate finger injury from the weight room near the end of August that ended up putting him out for more than two weeks, but hopefully he has fully recovered from that already.

As someone who has often struggled in the past producing in the final month of the season, Chapman will really need to dig deep and start making things happen in these final few games of the season. Not only will the Jays’ season be on the line, but heading into free agency at the end of the season, he needs to show everyone that he is worth the money in that he can consistently be both productive and valuable in the clutch.