JUNE 29: Toronto officially announced Romo’s signing Wednesday after he passed his physical. Righty Shaun Anderson was optioned to Triple-A Buffalo to clear active roster space, while reliever Tayler Saucedo was transferred to the 60-day injured list. Saucedo has already missed two months with right hip discomfort, so his transfer is a procedural move that won’t affect his eligibility to return. He’s on a minor league rehab assignment with Buffalo and figures to be reinstated within the next two weeks.
JUNE 27: The Blue Jays are signing veteran right-hander Sergio Romo to a Major League contract, reports Jon Heyman of the New York Post (Twitter link). The Meister Sports client was designated for assignment and subsequently released by the Mariners last week. As such, Seattle will be on the hook for the majority of Romo’s $2MM salary. The Jays will only owe him the prorated portion of the league minimum for any time spent on the MLB roster.
Romo, 39, yielded just one run through his first eight innings with the Mariners this season before melting down for five runs in two-thirds of an inning against the Orioles on the first of this month. That proved to be the start of a catastrophic collapse that saw the former Giants closer and three-time World Series champ yield a dozen runs over the course of just 6 1/3 innings. He allowed runs in five of his final nine appearances as a Mariner and ultimately finished his Seattle tenure with a grisly 8.16 ERA in 14 1/3 innings.
That said, Romo posted decent numbers with the 2021 A’s and the 2020 Twins, logging a combined 4.52 ERA with a 24.1% strikeout rate and 8.0% walk rate in 81 2/3 frames during that time. This season’s struggles came as he threw his signature slider at a 46.9% clip that represents his lowest usage of the pitch since way back in 2010. That slider has typically made Romo a death knell for opposing righties — career .204/.248/.356 slash line — but right-handed batters have uncharacteristically decimated Romo so far in 2022. It’s only a sample of 38 plate appearances, but righties have turned in a dominant .353/.395/.794 batting line when facing Romo this season. The Jays surely have some ideas on how to right that worrisome trend.
Romo’s addition comes at a time when the Jays have seen their in-house bullpen options thinned out dramatically in just a matter of weeks. Since June 8, they’ve lost lefty Andrew Vasquez (ankle sprain) and right-handers Trevor Richards (neck strain), Julian Merryweather (oblique strain), Yimi Garcia (back strain) and Nate Pearson (lat strain) to injuries. There’s no real risk from a financial standpoint, and if Romo’s struggles continue following a change of scenery, he can be quickly phased out in favor of an in-house option or a potential trade acquisition.
Bullpen problem solved, lol
Is he vaccinated?!
World series here we come!
Was hoping the Giants would bring him back for fun, and maybe a boost in energy in the slumping bullpen.
Romo #foreverGiant
Go bears
Hopefully he isn’t vaxed. I would hate to see him pitch in a hitters park with an 8+ ERA.
This is a funny comment
Unvaxed people can now travel to Canada, as of last week, i believe.
Not true
So Tanner Houck decided to stay home because he’s afraid of the Blue Jays lineup? Right.
That’s all they can come up with? Going to need more help than that. 2nd worse bullpen in the mlb won’t get you anywhere.
Thing is it takes two to tango and trades this early typically cost more
I re-read the story but still can’t find where it says that’s all they plan on doing. Can you help me out and point out where that is?
Right at the beginning under the prorated minimum part in really really small print, I don’t blame you for not seeing it
It’s just another arm to throw our there for the next few weeks, if he plays well maybe they keep him. But nobody but you is thinking he’s a solution.
Man this is just what we needed…in 2013.
Arash – 2013 was awesome hey, thanks, man
I’d rather go back to 2011
Well this should fix everything.
Bullpen has been pretty bad of late, he can’t make it any worse.
Or can he?
“Challenge accepted!”
The games Brand Hand blew last year cost us the post season. A temporary stop gap until the trade deadline. Unless we capture lightening in a bottle.
Jays lost 71 games last year, why were the Brand Hand games any more impactful than the Chatwood, dolis, etc blow ups?
Mic drop
He just wanted to scape goat someone, like if the Cardinals miss the playoffs by two games I’m gonna blame the two losses in June to the Cubs and marlins, all the other losses were irrelevant
Cheap and worth a look. Can’t be worse than what we have now.
it could definitely be worse
Jays don’t have bullpen issue of quality, they have a very nice back of the pen when healthy with cimber, Mayza, Garcia and Romano.
The problem has been usage, especially in the middle to back end of the pen. Starters have exploded too often and too early. Best way to address the issue is to get another reliable starter and punt the kikuchi turn around to next year
Romano is good. Cimber had one good year in his career, so who knows, we can hope. Mayza has been pretty much the definition of average every year. Garcia rates exactly average by wins above average this year and slightly below for his career (well below average last year).
A good bullpen needs more than one or two above league average pitchers… or at least a lot more depth of average pitchers.
They do additionally need more innings from the starters, but no innings-eating starting rotation can make this bullpen look scary to anyone in October.
Is Toronto that desperate?
oh yeah. our bullpen is a dumpster fire
No, it’s not. Bullpens can be a lot worse than what Toronto has. Think Washington in 2019 bad.
It could be worse, but when in the desert without a canteen you’ve got to take whatever you can get!
See what you did there. Like George Bensonhurst? Or Austin Powers? Carmen San Diego? San Francisco Ferdinand?
Think Twins, currently..
Toronto continues to free-fall and a few weeks ago, people were telling me they were one of the best teams in MLB.
They’re 3-7 in their last ten, but 8 games over 500, and in the playoffs right now. That ain’t what I’d call “free fall.” That’s a slump.
They’re a sub-500 team in June. They’ve dropped from 2nd to 4th in the AL East. They need some help as they look lost right now without leadership in that clubhouse.
Yeah they’re in 4th place but like you said its June. They are (7) in power rankings where they were last week. Yankees and Astros are the only two AL teams ahead of them in regard if you go by those
Yeah right, your nebulous notion of “leadership in the clubhouse” would somehow make up for several starting pitchers being in a slump at once?
They haven’t quit in any games, the offense has been making lots of impressive comeback attempts, and the bullpen has been doing it all it can with the very limited talent it has to work with. All evidence suggests clubhouse leadership is doing an excellent job, it just can’t help Kikuchi guide a ball to home plate.
And 4th place in the AL East would be 1st place in most divisions.
Free fall? Are you watching the jay games? Baseball is the streakiest sport in the world, all teams struggle, all teams have injuries.
Toronto is obviously gonna address the bullpen situation with bigger trades but it can’t really hurt to see if romo can be good for them
Lol
Next year, that’s our year!
All-star in 1922 maybe lol
This move scares me more so than the way the team has been playing in the past month.
Hopefully. the team just rides out the rest of the year without making any stupid trades.
The Blue Jays are not ready, and with the way the Yankee’s and Houston are playing its not worth it.
Next season go at it.
Ride the rest of the year out, with hopes of landing in the last wild card spot…gain some more play off experience… then tinker with what you need around the league..
Jays don’t have enough youth to ride out years. They feel young but they really aren’t. Springer and Teoscar are past their primes most likely, and most of the rest of the team is at least 28. They have to win in the next 2 or 3 years before they have to rebuild.
Can’t afford to wait until next year.
Literally none of what you wrote is true. Like we aren’t even talking about advance analytics or anything, just google ages. It’s ridiculous you could be this lazy and have completely false opinion on something so easy.
At 26.9 the jays are the THIRD YOUNGEST team by position players, behind only CLE and PIT.
Teoscar is 29 years only, can you please explain to me how he is ‘past his prime’.
The rest of the team is 28 he says,
Moreno-22
Kirk, Vlad -23
Bichette -24
Biggio, espinal -27
Lourdes-28
Chapman-29
Seriously just do a bit of research before you show up with that trash
Wow good work there Dustylamb. Where’d you get all that there information. Look it up in a dictionary? Very resourceful those Canucks are.
@ted
The romo move scares you? Every team in the league takes fliers on pitchers when faced with injuries….it’s ok, it’s normal
Lack of youth? Lack of prospects? Manoah,Kirk, Pearson, Espinal, Moreno, Groshans, Orelvis Martinez just to name a few. Guerrero and Bichette are only getting better and both are under 25. Springer is playing great ball, Teo is just fine and hasn’t hit 30 yet, coming off a 110+ rbi season. What are you watching honestly?
We would also have a better record if we weren’t in the AL east, sure houston is good but that division is a joke, and I would take our group of prospects over houston any day.
We’d have a better record if we weren’t in the AL east, that’s like saying I’d be a better cow if I weren’t a dog.
Dumb move. Waste of the paperwork. How long before Montoyo gets canned? How long before Atkins gets canned?
Maybe Atkins can re-acquire Rob Refsnyder and that will solve the Jay’s self-inflicted problems. Sarcasm heavy.
Sergio Santos? I remember him. Hey anyone who can pitch at this point would be welcome. This is only the beginning of the wheelin and dealin season.
Better off calling Sierra Santos.
Hope they give Romo some time to settle in. Start with some light calisthenics, walking around, some of those stretchy thigh master thingies, light tossing, throwing off flat ground, slowly building him up, stretching him out so he can be a serviceable member of the pen community. None of this rush rush, high leverage pressure right our of the chute. Some patience. As they say, Romo wasn’t built in a day.
Still shocked by the move
Even Jane says she’s done with Sergio!!
Nothing’s shocking. Jays don’t owe him nothing.
Double negative. That means the Jays owe him something. You should have said: “the Jays don’t owe him anything “.
Perry Farrell sighs
why?
No. Jays don’t need past their prime BP guy. It won’t work. See Jason Grilli.
Did Grilli have a prime?