Patrick Corbin signed a one-year, $1MM contract with the Blue Jays yesterday, and he made his organizational debut by tossing five scoreless innings and 74 pitches in a start for A-level Dunedin today. Prior to Corbin’s outing, Toronto manager John Schneider told MLB.com’s Keegan Matheson, Sportsnet and other media that the Jays would see how the start went before deciding on any further progression. While Corbin’s unsigned status kept him from participating in a normal Spring Training, Sportsnet’s Ben Nicholson-Smith wrote yesterday that Corbin has gone beyond 80-pitch workloads in his personal workouts, and tossing 74 pitches today certainly indicates that the left-hander’s arm seems pretty close to fully built up.
The recovery periods for such injured starters as Trey Yesavage, Jose Berrios, and Shane Bieber will naturally factor into how Corbin is used in Toronto, as Schneider left open the possibility that the veteran could be used in more of a long relief role. “We definitely view [Corbin] as a starter or a length option. Until the dominoes start to fall back into place with Trey, José and Bieber, you look for length and how we can use it,” Schneider said.
If and when the Blue Jays get close to their full complement of starters healthy, Corbin is likely the odd man out of a rotation mix, so a bullpen role might eventually be in his future. Using Corbin in the bullpen would also add some needed southpaw depth to Toronto’s relief corps, as left-handers Mason Fluharty and Brendon Little have both struggled badly in the early going in 2026.
More from around the AL East…
- Red Sox manager Alex Cora told MassLive.com’s Christopher Smith and other reporters that Kutter Crawford is also slated to throw four simulated innings on Monday or Tuesday before beginning a minor league rehab assignment. Crawford didn’t pitch in the majors or minors in 2025 due to both a lingering knee injury, and then wrist surgery. Between Crawford and Patrick Sandoval (Tommy John surgery) both on the verge of rehab assignments, the Sox may soon have a good deal of rotation depth. Boston already has five healthy starters in Garrett Crochet, Ranger Suarez, Sonny Gray, Brayan Bello, and Connelly Early, plus prospect Payton Tolle as another depth option. As the cliche goes, however, a team can never have too much pitching, and Johan Oviedo is now a question mark as he battles an elbow strain.
- Ryan Pepiot threw a bullpen session on Friday, and Marc Topkin of The Tampa Bay Times writes that the right-hander is expected back after the Rays’ April 6-12 homestand. Pepiot wasn’t expected to miss too much time after he started the season on the 15-day IL with right hip inflammation, and he projects to be out for roughly a week beyond the minimum 15-day absence. The 28-year-old Pepiot has been a solid part of Tampa’s rotation for two seasons, and the 2025 campaign saw him post a 3.86 ERA, a 24.6% strikeout rate, and a 9.0% walk rate over 167 2/3 innings.
- Also from Topkin, Edwin Uceta may be ready for a rehab assignment after tossing 22 pitches during an extended Spring Training game on Friday. Like Pepiot, Uceta also started the season on the 15-day IL, as the reliever was bothered by a right shoulder impingement that kept him from any game action during the Rays‘ big league spring camp.
The baseball media often raves about the A.L East, but when’s the last time anyone from the A.L East won the World Series?
Well, four of their teams have won pennants the last eight seasons which is pretty good.
The answer is 2018 and that’s better than the Central divisions.
More recently than every other AL team except for the two in the state of Texas.
BTW, in 15 of the last 20 WS the American League has been represented by a team from the East division or the state of Texas, so perhaps the attention is deserved.
You make solid points, but you still gotta win it all at some point to justify all the attention, no?
Did AL East teams not win it all in 2007, 2009, 2013, or 2018? The only division with more titles in the last 20 years is the NL West because the Giants had their dynasty run in the early 2010s and the Dodgers are having one right now. They get plenty of attention too, no?
The AL East is also home to three gigantic markets in Boston/New England, New York, and Toronto. The Red Sox and Yankees are two of the largest and most fanatical fanbases in the sport. That’s also going to drive a ton of coverage because they know it will hit more eyeballs by default. Between that and usually being at or near the top of the entire American League, it makes sense a lot of attention would be centered there.
2018
The AL East deserves all the respect they get and then some. It is the deepest, most competitive division in baseball. That division is a constant dogfight during the regular season. As for winning the World Series we’ve seen plenty of wild card team win the whole thing. Not winning the World Series does not discredit how loaded that division is. An MLB fan would recognize this without having to ask the question.
It’s a great division and a big challenge to win it each year. Just because no teams from it have been able to string together wins in 3 or 4 short playoff series over the past 8 years doesn’t detract from its standing as a tough division.
Corbin looked pretty good today. He pitched game 1 of a doubleheader with a start time of 3;10 or so. It was sunny and 87 at first pitch.
Velocity as high as 91 on his four-seam and the slider was as slow as 78. Only Low A hitters and MLB hitters are much better, but he pitched longer and better than I expected. His personal training kept him in really good shape.
Okay I’ll make the first post since it’s halftime.
I think Crawford and Sandoval will be factors this season. They will be needed, and after shaking off the rust they will do okay.
BTW – Is Roman the future fulltime DH for the Red Sox? I love the guy, but once again his throw today was …. not good.
His throws are roamin’.
Fever- How was Anthony’s defense last year, I thought he had a reputation for being a solid defensive outfielder. If the team was hitting those things would likely be overlooked. We need to score more than 2 runs if we are going to win games. Even the bad teams are going to be difficult to beat unless our pitchers are lights out and going more than 4 or 5 innings and the offense awakens from its winter hibernation. What is going on with Yoshida? I thought he was going to be the one getting on base the most. Now he has absolutely no trade value and is not contributing at all to the team. Hopefully we will start seeing more games like yesterday when we are driving in key runs.
I too was under the impression Roman was supposed to be a plus defender, and don’t remember seeing him having any issues in the field last summer. Am I just having selective memory? Was I mistaken? The two godawful throws he’s made already have me starting to wonder.
Dirty – Brace yourself before watching this video!
youtu.be/47JH2nePW4U?si=lrUc1ZkoYHVU_xkL
BTW – It’s actually been 3 bad throws he’s made this season already.
Lovely! I missed one of them, as I’ve only been able to watch about 3 and a half of the games so far. Was bad enough that I thought there were already 2. Good thing he’s in left and not right, then!
Defensive Runs Saved had him at +7 in the outfield last season, while statcast had him with 6 Outs Above Average and a +4 Defensive Run Value.
By most any metric, he was a comfortably above average performer on the grass last season.
That’s what I thought! Glad I am not crazy. He must have the yips or something right now. I hope he gets through it and gets back to playing well. We do also have to remember, as ready and poised as he has often looks he’s still 21 years old. Growing pains and mistakes are a natural part of the process.
Canuck – It’s the arm that is a concern, check out his rating last year.
fangraphs.com/leaders/major-league?lg=all&ind…
Uncle – FG gave Roman’s arm a negative rating last year. In his first game he let a base hit roll under his glove and all the way to the wall, the next day Cora embarrassed him in front of reporters.
I thought he had a solid reputation in the minors too, but I don’t follow the minors all that close. I can say with certainty he’s been below average in his short time with the big club.
Yoshida was hitless in ST until the end, I became concerned. I’m not as confident in him anymore, he can still get on base with walks but he is going through a really rough stretch with no hits.
Tomorrow is a must win, they need to jump all over Buehler. If they don’t they will not be able to score off the Padres great bullpen. Then they have Milwaukee which has been playing amazingly well. So if they lose tomorrow, there’s a good chance they are 2-10 by next weekend.
Asking because I legitimately don’t know and not because I’m trying to poke holes in your comment – are their arm rankings good? I don’t know what goes into that one, but do know that defensive metrics have been widely considered notoriously unreliable in general. Hopefully it’s something that can be considered noise? Sox Prospects, which is what I rely on the most for keeping tabs on the minor league pipeline, profiled his arm strength as above average, so I wasn’t expecting these noodle armed throws to be an issue with him.
Dirty – All defensive metrics are questionable. A couple years ago Soto was rated a top fielder, he got a GG nomination!
Yes I was referring to Sox Prospects too, I had read the same thing. How do we know they can be trusted? How do we know they don’t benefit from inflating the profiles? These analytics websites go unchallenged because it’s impossible to dispute their data.
I think Cora is telling the truth about Roman’s footwork impacting the throws. Either way, his struggles on throws can’t be disputed. I think that’s why he’s getting more time at DH than anyone expected.
I mean, I take them at face value because everyone analyzing the game – be it scouting prospects, statistical analysis of players, or anything else – has an incentive to be right if they want to be taken seriously. That doesn’t mean they’re always going to be right, but if they’re out there saying things that are obviously not true then their site would lose credibility and people would stop reading it. So if people who actually watch minor league games (I generally don’t) say he flashed a strong arm in the minors I have no reason to believe otherwise. If a stat ends up giving a result that doesn’t quite match with observed reality, well that’s why they have continued to develop new metrics. Sometimes you get wonky results that are due to a one year or small sample size aberration, sometimes there is just a flaw in the methodology and they devise something they think is better. Doesn’t seem we are quite there yet for a simple, elegant, and reliable metric to quantify defensive performance but I wouldn’t say anyone is out there trying to be wrong.
Fever- I am starting to feel the same. If they don’t start winning soon it is going to be nearly impossible to get back on track. They are losing against teams that were ranked well below them, when they start playing dominant teams it is going to be hopeless.
Anthony has been so hyped up you wonder if the pressure is getting to him. Even if he is not a great defender I assume he can be passable if he can get out of his head and calm down. I don’t think anyone was predicting him as the DH.
With Yoshida they almost need to create an injury and let him rehab in the minors to get this figured out. I am not ready to release him because we know he can get on base and he may even be as good as Anthony in the field. He seemed solid in the WBC.
Dirty – Their website is exclusively about Red Sox prospects, correct? It’s like therapists, they tell you what you want to hear because if they tell you what you don’t want to hear then you won’t go back to them. And wouldn’t it make sense for the front office to have some influence on the website, knowing that would convince everyone the prospects are better than they actually are?
I’ve checked back on their scouting reports after seeing certain prospects in the majors, I have to say many of the scouting reports were laughable.
Here’s one example, guess which player (the fielding comments are particularly comical):
“Potential impact everyday player. Ceiling of a consistent all-star. Still has some variance in his projection due to his unorthodox swing, but is a plus athlete. Took a major step forward in 2024 and established himself as one of the top prospects in all of baseball, a truly meteoric, unique rise from being a fairly unheralded Day 2 draft pick the previous July. Has made massive strides at the plate with his quality of contact while maintaining the ability to make good swing decisions. Hit-over-power profile, but hits the ball hard enough that he should be able to hit 15-plus home runs a season and a bunch of extra base hits while maintaining a high average and consistently getting on base. Might initially struggle with the adjustment to major league pitching, but has shown the ability to quickly adjust to new levels in the minors. Future defensive home remains to be determined, but shows the most promise at second base. Has the athleticism to handle short, third and center field potentially, but needs more reps defensively at whatever position he lands at and will have to show that he can adjust to the speed of the major leagues. Quiet personality, but has a very strong work ethic and has really taken to instruction, elevating himself into a high-end prospect in the process.”
By the way …. “shown the ability to quickly adjust to new levels in the minors”??? The guy wasn’t at any level long enough for opponents to get a book on him and make adjustments!
Uncle – The good news is both the O’s and Jays have been struggling, so the division doesn’t look as strong as originally expected. Sure they’ve been dealing with lots of injuries, but it’s still shocking to see them losing so much to the Rockies, White Sox, Pirates, Rangers, etc.
As you know I’m a huge believer in Roman. I agree he’s had so much attention and praise heaped on him the past few months, especially during the WBC, that we sometimes forget the kid is only 21 and hitting leadoff and being expected to carry the offense has to put at least some pressure on him. My only MINOR concern and I’ve said this before, he rarely looks happy. He usually looks unhappy and concerned/worried about something. Maybe he’s always been that way, I don’t know …… but it’s worth noting, he just doesn’t seem like he’s having fun.
I think Yoshida needs regular playing time, but he’s not gonna get it here. I don’t foresee another year of hiding him on the IL again. His contract is up after next year, he’s too young to retire. He knows he has to start earning another contract, therefore playing time will become more important to him.
That write up on Campbell is a laugher for sure, but I would argue some parts of that analysis are a good example of why their writers aren’t employed as scouts or analysts by any big league teams, lol! As far as I understand their writers don’t have any formal scouting backgrounds, so they’re going to have plenty of misses. Professional scouts miss plenty, too. It’s an imperfect science. So I don’t take what they say necessarily as gospel, but again if they watched Roman display plus arm strength in the minors I do believe he must have shown it.
They’re not owned by the team so unless the site owner really loves John Henry for some reason I don’t see any reason why as an independent outlet they wouldn’t be trying to make correct assessments. If you look at their rating scale, most guys even on the high end of the list they have graded as “average regulars” so I don’t see that as telling us what we want to hear. If you read other forums including this comment section they’re often full of people ready to give Tolle the Cy Young, and they have him as a 5.5 (above average regular) and the #2 guy in the system as an average regular (Franklin Arias). If they were only trying to exist by constantly telling us how great all these kids are I’d expect to see a lot more 6es and 7s.
Dirty – Maybe I’m on the pessimistic side from years of learning how things generally operate, but quite often influencers receive benefits for swaying opinions a certain way. Just like independent reporters (ie: Bradford) often paint the Red Sox in a positive light and refuse to ask the tough questions in exchange for access to the team, events etc I wouldn’t be surprised if certain Sox-themed prospect websites get kickbacks/perks for painting the prospects in a more positive light. Unfortunately that’s how the world works these days, the old I’ll-scratch-your-back-if-you-scratch-mine.
I can’t think of any other reason why a Sox prospect site would be constantly overhyping Sox prospects. If you can think of any good Sox players who were vastly underrated by them, you can change my mind.
Sure, but on the other hand a team like the Red Sox is going to have so much attention on its minor league pipeline it’s almost impossible for any of our prospects to be underrated because anyone who has a chance to make the jump is going to be on everyone’s radar. And our fanbase tends to fall in love with “the next guy” – if you’re a football fan to give a parallel example, maybe you’ll remember a few years back when a sizeable contingent of Pats fans were convinced Bailey Zappe was some stud in waiting who should have been starting QB ahead of Mac Jones (in truth they were both bums, as it turned out. Imagine that). They don’t need websites trying to pump the stock of our prospects because other MLB teams are smart enough to know better and as far as general public opinion is concerned, half our fans will do it for them. I may be wrong, but I don’t think they care enough about the other half of us to dump a lot of money into trying to convince us every single prospect in the system is going to make it and be the next big thing.
Sticking with the “our organization has too many eyes on it to produce a meaningful number of underrated prospects” line of thought, I don’t expect them to be making a bunch of calls on guys that nobody else saw coming. I just want to see a respectable hit rate on their assessments being generally correct. Which I’d say they do. Some highlights of guys on the current roster that they nailed:
Abreu: “Ceiling of an average regular. Development of hit tool will determine his major league potential. Has raw power and will take a walk, but needs to cut down on his swing-and-miss and show he can consistently make contact and impact the baseball against advanced pitching.”
Narvaez: “Potential defense-first backup catcher. Ceiling of a fringe starting catcher. High floor because of his defense. Chance to be an impact defender and add a little pop and on-base ability at the plate if he reaches his potential. Unlikely to add considerable value offensively”
Slaten: “Solid middle reliever with high-leverage potential. Fastball, slider and cutter give him three usable pitches. Has taken the necessary steps forward with his command and control to project as a major league bullpen piece. Has the stuff and demeanor you look for in a bullpen arm.”
Rafaela: “Defensive ability and versatility and speed give him a high floor, but will have to keep MLB pitchers from exploiting the aggressiveness evidenced by his high minor league chase rate. Excelled in Triple-A in 2023, but still needs to cut down on chasing pitches out of the zone and improve swing decisions and quality of contact.”
Wong: “Potential MLB backup or up-and-down catcher. Ceiling of a platoon catcher who will have a season or two of starter-level production. Has already earned the trust of the organization as the third catcher on the 40-man roster, but has yet to get much run in the majors. Will have to make more contact”
Bello: “Potential mid-rotation starter. Ceiling of a number two starter or high-end number three. At his best, will flash three at least above-average pitches, and on the right day, all will look like potential plus pitches. Has done a great job improving his delivery and command to the point where you can comfortably project him as a starter.”
Duran: “Ability to reach his ceiling is dependent on keeping the swing-and-miss in his game manageable and continuing to improve defensively. Swing changes that allowed him to tap into his raw power have not translated to the major league level and now needs to adjust again to be able to handle major league pitching.”
Whitlock: “Potential mid-rotation starter or late-inning reliever. Has excelled in a bullpen role, but has the size and three-pitch mix that could work in a starting role. Improvement of changeup and increased velocity have raised his ceiling significantly since his selection in the Rule 5 Draft.”
Unrelated, but in other news, after this weekend I think I need to take a few weeks off from watching these games. Just downright disgusting. So much for run prevention!
Dirty – Nice work, you convinced me! And I agree with your first paragraph, as a high profile team their prospects automatically get viewed as being better than they are.
Dirty – I am shocked to have just heard Dave O’Brien of all people say the Sox are in big trouble, despite being down only one run in the 8th. Even the most pollyannaish are starting to see what we are seeing.
Padres kept trying to give away the game, but the Sox kept giving it back. I’m so happy for Yoshida, especially with the 2-run double against the LHP. Hope he gets more playing time with Rafaela getting less.
It’s almost Miller Time …. I’m a glutton for punishment, but the guy is absolutely incredible.
That was great to see for Yoshi, he needed that and the team needs somebody (really, multiple guys, but somebody has to be the first) besides Abreu to get going.
It’s uncanny how every time they have fought back to tie a game or take a lead, they seem to give it right back the next half inning. That’s what is so extra deflating about it. They’ve excelled in close games in the past but just being so incapable of holding a lead or even a tie right now is not good for my morale so I can’t imagine how frustrating it is for the hitters.
We finally score a decent number of runs but errors and bad pitching do us in. Depressing. I was not familiar with Suarez when the Sox gave him the big contract. In general people seemed happy. So far he seems like a bust.
Uncle – I’m not giving up on Suarez. He had a messed up ST, he should improve with time. Was he an overpay? Yes, absolutely.
This team has too many good players to be this bad. It’s the system, the coaching, and the managing that’s the problem.
I 100% agree I think there’s a big coaching issue. None of these guys would have gotten this far in baseball if they were actually so incapable of putting bat to ball. The issue is they’re trying to coach guys to just go up there and swing as hard as they possibly can. All it’s done is gotten Casas hurt and turned others into strikeout factories. When you consider guys like Story, Duran, and Rafaela had enough swing and miss in their skillset before they de-emphasized contact hitting, it’s no mystery why they look unplayable for weeks at a time. How much more of this do we need to see before someone upstairs admits it’s not working?
Did they make any major changes to the coaching staff from last year? Both the pitching and offense seemed more effective last year.
Dirty – As we all know the current regime (Breslow, Driveline) is very heavy into analytics, and it shows with the high K rate and low OBP and poor defense and poor fundamentals like baserunning. It’s absolutely not working. Far too many talented prospects are failing at the major league level, or failing with the Red Sox organization and then flourishing when they go to another team.
When Tibbs said this, it once again confirms the Red Sox need to remove Driveline and let players feel comfortable doing what works for them individually.
“I’ve never lost confidence in my ability to play the game,” Tibbs told Weintraub. “It was just a matter of figuring out the kinks and getting back to me. The Dodgers told me, ‘We love what you do, and we just want you to get back to that.’ That was a breath of fresh air for me.”
Uncle – No changes from last year, but they failed with several players last year.
Campbell
Tibbs
Harrison
Rafaela
All of them were awful in the second half of the season.
Patrick Corbin seems ready maybe they give him a start at AAA but he is already built up and nothing seemed worrisome today in his start.
>as left-handers Mason Fluharty and Brendon Little have both struggled badly
Not even close to true on Fluharty. His first appearance, he was drilled by comebackers from both batters he faced. He left the game with leg soreness. Both batters reached base safely and later scored. In his four appearances since, he has a 3.38 ERA and 1.31 FIP.
Please fire Cora‼️ He has no idea how, where, and when to use what Breslow has provided‼️ And dump the hitting coaches, holes in the swings of 70% of the lineup, basic things, heads off the balls, teying to pull outside pitches, complete lack of instruction going oppo. This batting order is idiotic, and stifles their limited speed…hideous