Red Sox Fire Manager Alex Cora, Announce Coaching Changes
In a stunning early-season move, the Red Sox have fired manager Alex Cora, per Jeff Passan of ESPN. According to Gabrielle Starr of the Boston Herald, Triple-A manager Chad Tracy will serve as interim manager for the big-league club. Many of Cora’s coaching staff are also being let go. Per Julian McWilliams of CBS Sports, the club is parting ways with hitting coaches Pete Fatse and Dillon Lawson. Passan adds that bench coach Ramon Vazquez and third base coach Kyle Hudson have also been let go. Chris Cotillo of MassLive adds hitting strategy coach Joe Cronin to the list. Per Ari Alexander of 7News Boston, game planning and run prevention coach Jason Varitek is being reassigned to a different role in the organization.
Red Sox owner John Henry issued the following statement:
Alex Cora led this organization to one of the greatest seasons in Red Sox history in 2018, and for that, and the many years that followed, he will always have our deepest gratitude. He has had a lasting impact on this team and on this city. He has led on and off the field in so many important ways. These decisions are never easy, but this one is especially difficult given what Alex has meant to the Red Sox since the day he arrived.
I want to thank Alex, our coaches, and their families for everything they have given to this organization. They have been part of this club in a way that goes beyond the field, and they will always have our respect and gratitude.
The Red Sox are off to a brutal 10-17 start in 2026. They are currently in last place in the AL East. That kind of performance is well below expectations for a club that earned a Wild Card spot in last year’s playoffs and made several moves to upgrade the roster during the offseason. It is difficult to say how much of that blame is on Cora as the manager, but evidently, the club felt a massive shakeup was necessary to break out of their slump.
Cora has served as the team’s manager since 2018, save for a one-year absence in 2020 while serving a suspension for his role in the Astros’ 2017 sign-stealing scandal. He compiled a 620-541 (.534) record in his time leading the Red Sox. His first season was undoubtedly his best, as the team won 108 games and defeated the Dodgers in five games to claim their fourth World Series title of the century.
Since returning from his suspension, the club’s performance under Cora has been less consistent. A 92-win season in 2021 was followed by last-place finishes in 2022-23, a .500 season in 2024, and 89 wins in 2025. Nonetheless, he is regarded as one of the top managers in the game and widely respected by his players. The team signed him to a three-year, $21.75MM extension in July 2024, which covered the 2025-27 seasons. The $7.25MM annual salary made Cora one of the highest-paid managers in the game.
The extension was also notable because it followed a recent change in baseball operations leadership. Chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom was fired in September 2023. He was replaced by Craig Breslow. Given the change in top brass, it was fair to wonder if Cora would stay beyond 2024, the last year of his contract. The fact that Cora was extended through 2027 signaled confidence in his leadership and a desire for continuity under Breslow. In that context, Cora’s departure less than halfway through the extension is even more surprising.
In the end, the team’s performance this year may have simply been bad enough for club executives to want a change. Red Sox hitters have batted just .226/.306/.335 through their first 26 games, not including today’s blowout win. That amounts to a 78 wRC+, which ranks dead last in the Majors. Among their qualified hitters, Wilyer Abreu (130 wRC+) and trade acquisition Willson Contreras (115 wRC+) are the only ones performing at an above-average level. The other hitters range from below-average to downright dreadful.
It is still very early in the season, so small sample sizes need to be taken into account. However, the fact that the team’s offense is collectively struggling to this extent is more worrisome than if merely one or two players were underperforming. As with Cora as manager, it’s hard to say how much of that falls on the coaching staff, though it is noteworthy that most of the departing staff members are hitting coaches rather than pitching coaches.
On the pitching side, pitching coach Andrew Bailey and bullpen coach Chris Holt will remain in their roles, according to Cotillo. Red Sox pitchers have underperformed just like the hitters, though the club is undoubtedly banking on positive regression as the season goes on. Garrett Crochet is off to a rough start, including a 10 earned run shelling on April 13, but he is one of the top five starters in the game and will surely recover. The team signed Ranger Suarez to a five-year deal over the offseason, and he is due for positive regression as well.
Like the offense, the rotation has talented young players like Connelly Early, Brayan Bello, and Payton Tolle at its disposal. However, the club may have greater confidence in the pitching staff’s ability to rebound due to the track records of veterans Crochet, Suarez, and Sonny Gray (who is currently injured). The bullpen, which has a 3.73 ERA, similarly features veterans Aroldis Chapman and Garrett Whitlock. In contrast, most of the offensive struggles are from talented players with shorter track records, such as Caleb Durbin and Ceddanne Rafaela, as well as veterans who have struggled in recent years, like Trevor Story.
Time will tell if the managerial and coaching changes will bring about improved performance from the Red Sox. In order to match last season’s 89 wins, the club would need to play at 95-win pace the rest of the way. That is a significant challenge, of course, but perhaps not an insurmountable one with the young talent on the roster. As for Cora, he may look for a new managerial gig or even a role in a front office. He has expressed interest in front office roles before, including around the time of his July 2024 extension. Given his overall track record, he is a lock to find another role in baseball if he wants it.
More to come.
Astros Reinstate Bennett Sousa From Injured List
The Astros have activated left-hander Bennett Sousa from the 15-day injured list, according to Matt Kawahara of the Houston Chronicle. Fellow lefty Colton Gordon is being optioned in a corresponding move.
Sousa ended 2025 on the injured list with left elbow inflammation and has been out so far in 2026 due to a left oblique strain. The erstwhile waiver claim broke out as a key reliever for Houston in 2025 before the elbow injury. In 50 2/3 innings across 44 appearances, Sousa had a 2.84 ERA and struck out 29.6% of opposing hitters. His performance was no fluke, as Sousa’s 2.88 xERA and 2.72 FIP were close matches for his bottom-line numbers. He is still a pre-arbitration player and won’t reach free agency until 2030, so he is valuable from a contract standpoint as well.
Sousa’s return gives Houston a third solid lefty reliever to complement Bryan King and Steven Okert. Like Sousa, King did well in an extended look in 2025, posting a 2.78 ERA and strong expected stats in 68 innings. Although he surrendered 10 home runs (1.38 HR/9), he demonstrated pristine control with a 4.0% walk rate and generated plenty of soft contact. Meanwhile, the veteran Okert navigated a drop in four-seam velocity to improve his control and keep the ball in the yard. He allowed six home runs in 71 2/3 innings last year after allowing six in less than half the innings for the Twins the year before.
Having the trio of King, Okert, and Sousa is a boon for a Houston bullpen that is missing its most prized lefty. Closer Josh Hader is currently on the 60-day injured list with left biceps tendinitis and is eligible to return in late May at the earliest. Enyel De Los Santos has recorded three of the team’s six saves in Hader’s absence. A repeat performance from Sousa would go a long way to stabilizing the bullpen, which has struggled overall. Key arms like Bryan Abreu and Ryan Weiss are off to bad starts, and the group’s 5.94 ERA is better than only the Royals.
As for Gordon, the 27-year-old heads to Triple-A where he’ll bide his time as a depth option. The 2021 eighth-round draft pick debuted in the Majors last year but was largely ineffective. Gordon posted a 5.34 ERA in 86 innings across 20 appearances, 14 of which were starts. He also struck out a below-average 19.0% of hitters and surrendered more than two home runs per nine innings. His 5.1% career walk rate is a positive, but not enough to overcome the rest of his profile. Having mostly worked as a starter, Gordon could receive the stray spot start or long relief appearance if and when he gets brought back up.
Photo courtesy of Troy Taormina, Imagn Images
Sam Huff Clears Waivers, Elects Free Agency
April 25: Huff has cleared waivers and elected free agency in lieu of accepting an outright assignment, per Jake Rill of MLB.com.
April 21: The Orioles announced Tuesday that catcher Sam Huff has been designated for assignment. His roster spot will go to catcher Adley Rutschman, who’s returning from a brief stay on the 10-day injured list due to a minor ankle injury.
Huff was just selected to the big league roster last week. He appeared in three games with Baltimore, going 2-for-9 with a double, an RBI and five strikeouts in nine plate appearances. With Rutschman back from the injured list, however, the O’s can turn catching duties back over to their Opening Day tandem of Rutschman and prospect Samuel Basallo.
Huff, 28, signed a minor league deal with the O’s in January. The former Rangers top prospect has now played in parts of six big league seasons and slashed a respectable .246/.299/.427 with a dozen homers in 281 trips to the batter’s box. That’s roughly league-average offense, by measure of wRC+, and more than 10% better than the standard catcher. However, Huff’s output has come in spite of a colossal 36.3% strikeout rate. He’s needed a .354 average on balls in play just to get to league-average with the bat. As such, he’s highly unlikely to sustain his current pace.
On the defensive side of things, Huff has solid framing grades in his limited major league work. He’s struggled with blocking balls in the dirt and controlling the run game. The former seventh-round pick has just an 18.5% caught-stealing rate in his career and has been charged with eight passed balls in 527 innings behind the dish.
Baltimore will have five days to trade Huff or place him on outright waivers. (The latter seems likelier.) Waivers would be another 48-hour process, so the outcome of today’s DFA will be known within a week. If he clears waivers, Huff could be assigned outright to Triple-A Norfolk, where he hit .156/.250/.168 in 36 plate appearances before being summoned to the big leagues. However, since he’s previously been outrighted in the past, he’d have the right to reject a minor league assignment in favor of free agency.
AL East Injury Notes: Stanton, Rodón, Gray, Melton
Yankees designated hitter Giancarlo Stanton exited yesterday’s game against the Astros in the sixth inning with right calf tightness. Manager Aaron Boone downplayed the seriousness of this issue, telling Chandler Rome of The Athletic it was “too early” for him to be concerned. “Hopefully we got ahead of anything serious, but we’ll just see where he’s at tomorrow,” said Boone. Stanton is on the bench for today’s game, and no injury list move is pending as of now.
The 36-year-old missed the first half of last season with injuries to both his elbows. Dating back to the 2021 season, he has missed roughly one third of his team’s games, mostly due to lower body injuries. Even so, he remains a crucial part of the lineup. In last year’s half-season, Stanton hit 24 home runs and posted a .321 isolated slugging percentage, his highest mark since coming to New York in 2018. He is not quite at that level so far in 2026, though the team would obviously prefer him healthy and in the lineup. If he eventually misses time this year, that could result in DH at bats for role players like Paul Goldschmidt and Amed Rosario, neither of whom is an inspiring option in a larger role.
A few more injury notes out of the AL East:
- On the pitching side in New York, left-hander Carlos Rodón made his first rehab start yesterday for the Yankees’ High-A affiliate. According to Shanthi Sepe-Chepuru of MLB.com, the club anticipates he’ll need three rehab starts before rejoining the rotation. Assuming he stays on track, that could put him in line to start at the end of the May 8-10 series against the Brewers, or possibly against Baltimore from May 11-13. New York’s rotation has been exceptional to start the year, posting league-best marks in ERA (2.61) and K-BB rate (19.7%). Luis Gil has been the only weak spot, so he’s the likeliest candidate for a demotion when Rodón makes his return.
- Injured Red Sox starter Sonny Gray is traveling with the team and set to throw a bullpen session on Monday, per manager Alex Cora (link via Chris Cotillo of MassLive). That implies the right-hander, who was placed on the 15-day IL on Monday, will not require a rehab assignment and could return with a minimal absence. That would be welcome news for Boston, as their rotation has struggled to a 4.61 ERA through their first 26 games. Gray isn’t off to a great start himself, but he was a capable mid-rotation arm from 2023-25, so the club is unbothered by the results in a small sample size. His eventual return may spell a demotion for Payton Tolle, who struck out 11 hitters in six innings in his season debut on Thursday.
- Rays outfield prospect Jacob Melton has a Grade 2 left ankle sprain and is out of game action for 4-6 weeks, according to Marc Topkin of The Tampa Bay Times. Melton, who was acquired in a three-team trade in December, currently ranks as the club’s third-best prospect according to MLB.com. He is likely to see time in the Majors this year. The starting outfielders – Chandler Simpson, Jake Fraley, and Cedric Mullins – all have plus range or arm strength, but they are also below-average hitters. Melton’s scouting report mentions room for improvement on his hit tool, though he flashed plus power at Triple-A in 2024-25 and is a solid defender.
Photo courtesy of Maria Lysaker, Imagn Images
Blue Jays To Activate Trey Yesavage On Tuesday
Trey Yesavage is ready for his 2026 debut, as the rookie right-hander will be activated from the 15-day injured list prior to Tuesday’s game with the Red Sox. Blue Jays manager John Schneider told reporters (including MLB.com’s Keegan Matheson) that Dylan Cease, Yesavage, and Max Scherzer will start during the three-game series against Boston. Cease and Patrick Corbin will swap places in the rotation so Corbin will now face the Guardians on Sunday, and Eric Lauer will be moved from a starting role into a long relief role.
Yesavage had never thrown a professional pitch prior to 2025, and his quick path from A-ball to the Blue Jays’ World Series rotation was one of the key storylines of Toronto’s postseason run. After debuting in September with a 3.21 ERA over his first 14 big league innings, Yesavage then had a 3.58 ERA over six games and 27 2/3 frames in the playoffs, highlighted by an epic seven-inning, 12-strikeout performance against the Dodgers in Game 5 of the World Series.
Between the minors, the majors, and the postseason, Yesavage threw a total of 139 2/3 innings in 2025 — a marked increase from the 98 innings Yesavage threw for East Carolina University in 2024 before Toronto made him the 20th overall pick of the 2024 draft. As such, there was already a sense that the Blue Jays would look to limit Yesavage’s innings in 2026 in order to keep the righty from overextending himself, though an immediate hurdle arose when Yesavage arrived at Spring Training with a shoulder impingement.
The Jays took it slow with Yesavage’s workload in camp, and then placed him on the 15-day IL to begin the season so the right-hander could continue to ramp up at his own pace. Yesavage has made four minor league rehab starts, and his most recent outing with Triple-A Buffalo on April 21 saw him toss only 64 pitches, in a step backwards from the 71 pitches he threw in his previous start. Yesavage also has a 7.50 ERA and a 12.5% walk rate across his 12 rehab innings, though on-field results are less important than feel and comfort during a rehab assignment.
As Matheson noted, Yesavage “typically landed more in the range of 65 to 85 pitches” per outing in 2025, and the Blue Jays will probably keep him on something of a similar leash this year. The goal is to keep Yesavage fully past any lingering after-effects of his shoulder problem, and also to keep him fresh for what the Jays hope will be another deep run into October.
For the moment, however, simply getting back to the .500 mark is the first order of business for the 10-15 Blue Jays. Yesavage is one of seven pitchers and 12 players overall on Toronto’s injured list, as a swath of health problems big and small have caused the Jays to stumble out of the gate this season. For the rotation in particular, the absences of Yesavage, Shane Bieber, Jose Berrios, and (to a season-ending ACL tear) Cody Ponce has left the Jays scrambling for pitching despite what seemed to be a surplus of starters in March.
Cease and Kevin Gausman have both been very good, and Patrick Corbin (signed to a one-year, $1MM deal as a response to all the injuries) has managed a respectable 3.86 ERA over three starts and 14 2/3 innings. Scherzer and Lauer have each been hit hard, which is also part of reason for Lauer’s shift back to relief work.
Lauer has been public about his desire to work both as a starter and not work behind an opener when starting, though his 6.75 ERA over 22 2/3 innings has left the southpaw with little room to contest a role change. In regards to Lauer’s comments, Schneider said “he’s still going to pitch meaningful innings for us. Our rotation has been and maybe will continue to be in flux. He was playing catch-up, I think. After his first outing, his stuff was down and there were some delivery things. Just talking to him yesterday, there’s still an opportunity to work on those things.”
Having Lauer work multiple innings out of the bullpen could help him get on track, and should also help relieve some of the pressure on the Blue Jays’ overtaxed relief corps. The 113 1/3 innings pitched by Toronto’s relievers is the fifth-highest total of any bullpen in the league, while the rotation’s 109 1/3 innings are the third-fewest in baseball.
Phillies Reinstate Zack Wheeler From 15-Day Injured List
Zack Wheeler is officially back on the Phillies’ roster, as the team announced that the right-hander has been reinstated from the 15-day injured list in time to start tonight’s game against the Braves. Righty Alex McFarlane was optioned to Triple-A to create space on the 26-man roster.
The three-time All-Star last appeared in a big league game on August 15, as his 2025 season was unexpectedly brought to an early end after Wheeler posted a 2.71 ERA over 24 starts and 149 2/3 innings. Wheeler was placed on the IL the next day due to the discovery of a blood clot near his throwing shoulder, and he quickly underwent surgery to have the clot removed. A thoracic outlet syndrome procedure followed in late September, and the fact that Wheeler had the venous form of TOS provided some hope that he would be able to return to pitching in relatively short order. (By comparison, the neurogenic form of TOS is more harmful to a pitcher’s recovery since it relates to nerve problems, if less of a threat health-wise.)
The initial optimism over Wheeler’s potential for a quicker return has proved true in the sense that the ace will be back on the mound today, almost exactly seven months to the day after his surgery. What remains to be seen, of course, is whether or not Wheeler will be able to return as a front-of-the-rotation starter. While TOS surgery is still a relatively new procedure and there isn’t a lengthy track record on recoveries, the list of pitchers who haven’t been the same after the surgery is considerably longer than the list of pitchers who returned in good form. Merrill Kelly is the best-case scenario of a hurler who continued to pitch well after undergoing a TOS procedure.
In terms of pure results, Wheeler’s 5.85 ERA over 20 innings in five rehab starts isn’t a great sign, nor is the fact that his average fastball velocity sat at only 92.9mph. (Wheeler’s career average is 95.8mph.) Still, Wheeler threw at least 72 pitches in each of his last two outings, and Phillies manager Rob Thomson suggested earlier this week that Wheeler wouldn’t be used beyond six innings or around the 90-pitch mark tonight.
Even if it may take a while before Wheeler looks like his old self, even a C+ version of Wheeler can boost a Phillies rotation that has struggled massively in the early going. The rotation’s cumulative 5.68 ERA ranks 28th of 30 teams in starter ERA, as everyone besides Cristopher Sanchez has yet to get on track. The starters have been only one piece of what has basically been a team-wide slump for the 8-18 Phillies, who take a 10-game losing streak into tonight’s contest.
Reds Place Eugenio Suárez On 10-Day Injured List
TODAY: Cincinnati officially announced Suarez’s IL placement, retroactive to April 24. Right-hander Kyle Nicolas was also optioned to Triple-A, and Bleday and right-hander Jose Franco were called up from Triple-A in corresponding moves.
APRIL 24: The Reds will place Eugenio Suárez on the 10-day injured list with a low-grade oblique strain, manager Terry Francona told reporters (including Charlie Goldsmith). He was scratched from tonight’s game with what the team initially called mid-back discomfort.
Although oblique strains can linger for hitters, this one doesn’t appear to be particularly serious. Goldsmith writes that the team is hopeful Suárez can resume baseball activities after a brief shutdown and reevaluation. The Reds can backdate the placement to April 23, meaning the earliest he could return is May 3.
Outfielder JJ Bleday was removed from tonight’s Triple-A game after two plate appearances. That seemingly points to him being recalled tomorrow as the corresponding move. It would be Bleday’s first look at the MLB level with Cincinnati. He has been on optional assignment all year but is on a tear in the minors, batting .345 with six homers through his first 23 games.
Bleday isn’t a direct positional replacement for Suárez, but the Reds have used the latter mostly as a designated hitter. He has only made six starts at the hot corner compared to 18 appearances as the DH. They’re a much better defensive team with Ke’Bryan Hayes at third base, but the two-time Gold Glove winner is out to a terrible start at the plate.
Hayes is hitting .081 with one home run in his first 68 trips to the dish. Cincinnati has managed to keep winning despite getting nothing offensively from Hayes, catcher Tyler Stephenson, or any of their outfielders. Suárez hasn’t been particularly productive either, batting .231/.300/.363 with just three home runs through his first 100 plate appearances.
The Reds nevertheless pulled out another improbable win on Friday. Nathaniel Lowe, who drew into the lineup at DH with Suárez out, hit a walk-off two-run homer off Kenley Jansen with two outs in the ninth. That was Lowe’s second of the night, his first two longballs in a Cincinnati uniform. They’re up to 17-9 despite entering the night ranked 24th in MLB in scoring.
Lowe figures to pick up most of the extra at-bats while Suárez is sidelined. The bench skews left-handed and will lean even more in that direction if Bleday is the corresponding move. Lowe has a decent career track record against pitchers of either handedness and got the DH assignment tonight against Detroit southpaw Framber Valdez. Hayes seems assured of continued run at third base for the time being.
Latest On Francisco Lindor’s Recovery Timeline
Francisco Lindor was placed on the Mets’ 10-day injured list on Thursday due to a left calf strain, and the team now has a loose idea about how long the All-Star shortstop may be out of action. Manager Carlos Mendoza and president of baseball operations David Stearns told reporters (including the New York Post’s Jake Nisse) yesterday that Lindor will be in a walking boot for the next week, and will be fully re-evaluated in three weeks’ time.
If all goes well, Lindor projects to be back in the Mets’ lineup before the end of May. Supposing that Lindor is given the green light in mid-May after his three-week shutdown, he’ll need at least a week of baseball activities and workouts to bring him back up to speed, plus at least a couple of rehab games.
This is just the best-case scenario, however. A more concrete timeline can’t be established until after Lindor is re-evaluated, and it is certainly possible that his calf might still be sore after three weeks’ time. Calf injuries have been known to linger or even to be season-threatening in more severe cases, though there isn’t any sign that Lindor’s issue is anything that serious.
It has already been an injury-marred season for Lindor, as he missed most of Spring Training due to hamate bone surgery. Lindor was able to make it back and play a few Grapefruit League games before the end of camp and avoided a season-opening stint on the injured list, yet it seems like the missed time had an impact. Lindor has a modest .226/.314/.355 slash line over his first 105 plate appearances, far below his usual standard.
Even if Lindor is able to return by late May, losing their star shortstop for “only” a month is still a major blow for the struggling Mets to try and overcome. New York has a dismal 9-17 record and is already 9.5 games behind the Braves for first place in the NL East. Virtually the entire Mets lineup is off to a collective slow start at the plate, and the loss of Juan Soto (to a calf strain of his own) for just shy of three weeks only worsened the offensive power outage.
Ronny Mauricio probably isn’t the answer to these batting woes, as Mauricio has hit only .236/.294/.357 over 303 career plate appearances in the majors. However, Mauricio is a former top prospect who has a history of crushing Triple-A pitching, so he’ll get another chance to break out as the expected regular shortstop in Lindor’s absence.
White Sox Designate Reese McGuire, Select Drew Romo
The White Sox announced that catcher Reese McGuire has been designated for assignment. Taking McGuire’s spot on both the 26-man and 40-man rosters is catcher Drew Romo, whose contract has been selected from Triple-A Charlotte.
After signing a minor league deal with the Brewers during the offseason, McGuire triggered an opt-out clause in the contract a few days before Opening Day when it became clear that he wasn’t making Milwaukee’s active roster. McGuire then signed a one-year deal worth $1.2MM in guaranteed money to join Chicago’s roster, as the Sox needed some veteran help to complement Edgar Quero while Kyle Teel was on the injured list. (Korey Lee was also designated for assignment and then outrighted off Chicago’s 40-man roster, as the White Sox seemingly preferred McGuire over Lee.)
The results haven’t been pretty for either Quero or McGuire, as the duo have combined for -0.6 bWAR (the lowest bWAR of any team’s catching corps) in the first month of play. Quero is hitting only .153/.271/.169 over 72 PA, while McGuire has slashed a near-identical .172/.273/.172 over 34 PA. Quero’s struggles are a bigger-picture concern for the White Sox since the young backstop is viewed as a potential building block, yet McGuire is naturally the far more expendable of the two.
If another team claims McGuire off waivers, they’ll absorb the approximately $1MM remaining of McGuire’s 2026 salary. The White Sox may be hoping that the price tag scares off any teams who might be thin enough at catcher to consider a claim, so that McGuire can clear waivers and be outrighted to Triple-A Charlotte.
Since McGuire has been outrighted in the past, however, he has the right to reject any future outright assignments in favor of free agency, so he’ll have some leverage if he does make it through the waiver wire. McGuire also has more than five years of MLB service time, so he would be able to keep his remaining $1MM-ish salary even if he did reject an outright assignment and become a free agent. Any new team who then signed McGuire would only owe him the prorated MLB minimum salary, which would be subtracted from what the White Sox still owe the catcher.
Romo landed with the Sox via a waiver claim off the Mets’ roster in January. This was the third waiver claim in a little over a month for Romo, who went from the Rockies (the team that drafted him 35th overall in 2020) to the Orioles to the Mets and finally to the Southsiders. Chicago then designated Romo for assignment and subsequently outrighted him in February, and Romo didn’t have the ability to elect free agency.
His stint at Triple-A Charlotte has been a smash to date, as Romo has hit .298/.385/.561 with four home runs over his first 68 PA for the Knights. Matching anything close to that production in the big leagues is far-fetched, but it is possible Romo might still hold some late bloomer potential. The catcher is only 24 years old, and his big league resume consists of only 20 plate appearances with Colorado in 2024-25.
Romo will get another chance to show what he can do against MLB pitching, and even an average level of offense would be both an upgrade over McGuire and a chance to take some at-bats away from the struggling Quero. As for Teel, he has already passed the initial 4-to-6 week recovery timeframe for his Grade 2 hamstring strain, yet White Sox GM Chris Getz told MLB.com’s Scott Merkin and other reporters that Teel isn’t quite yet ready to begin a minor league rehab assignment.
Blue Jays Select Yohendrick Pinango, Place Nathan Lukes On 10-Day Injured List
The Blue Jays announced that outfielder Nathan Lukes has been placed on the 10-day injured list due to a left hamstring strain. Taking Lukes’ place on the active roster is outfield prospect Yohendrick Pinango, whose contract has been selected from Triple-A Buffalo. Right-hander Yimi Garcia was moved from the 15-day IL to the 60-day IL in order to create space for Pinango on Toronto’s 40-man roster. Prior to the Jays’ official announcement, the Ander Beisbol X account was the first to report that Pinango was on his way to the Show for his first taste of MLB action.
Friday’s 8-6 Jays loss to the Guardians saw Lukes lead off the bottom of the first with a double, but the right fielder then had to be replaced by pinch-runner Davis Schneider due to the hamstring issue. Blue Jays manager John Schneider is expected to update reporters today on the outcome of Lukes’ MRI, though obviously the problem was immediately serious enough to warrant an IL placement.
George Springer (toe fracture) and Addison Barger (ankle sprain) are making progress in their recoveries and could be activated from the 10-day IL within a week’s time. That said, Lukes is now the 12th player on Toronto’s current injured list, adding to what has been a snakebitten start to the Blue Jays’ defense of their American League title.
Lukes in particular has had a tough go of things, as the outfielder has spent much of the season plagued by vertigo symptoms. A visit to a specialist in Phoenix during the Jays’ recent series with the Diamondbacks seemed to solve things — Lukes had just two hits over his first 34 trips to the plate before the Arizona series, but then posted a 1.260 OPS over his next 22 PA, going 11-for-21 with four doubles.
The hamstring strain both interrupts this hot streak for Lukes, and creates another vacancy in Toronto’s outfield. The Jays have already had to dig pretty deep into their depth chart to address their many injuries on the pitching and position-player sides, and the situation has now created an opportunity for Pinango (who turns 24 next month) to make his big league debut.
Pinango began his career as a Cubs international signing in 2018, and he was dealt to the Jays along with minor league infielder Josh Rivera in the 2024 deadline trade that saw Nate Pearson sent to Wrigleyville. Pinango hit .235/.335/.379 over his first 340 Triple-A plate appearances in 2025, and he has jumped out to a .288/.370/.488 slash line and three homers over 92 PA for Buffalo this season.
MLB Pipeline ranks Pinango as the 10th-best prospect in the Blue Jays’ farm system, with Baseball America slotting him 11th on their list. His lack of defensive value hurts his ceiling, as Pinango is seen as a below-average corner outfielder at best who is probably best suited for a DH spot. That puts more pressure on his bat, and his ability to consistently get the ball into the air. When he is able to keep the ball off the ground, Pinango has displayed intriguing raw power to go along with his solid contact skills and excellent bat speed.
While Pinango lacks Lukes’ defensive upside, he’ll fill in as a left-handed option in Toronto’s outfield mix. Pinango joins Jesus Sanchez as the left-handed hitting corner outfielders, with Davis Schneider and Myles Straw providing right-handed complements.
Garcia underwent surgery last September to fix scar tissue in his throwing elbow, and the Jays were slowplaying his ramp-up period throughout Spring Training and in the early part of the 2026 season. The shift to the 60-man now delays Garcia’s 2026 debut until the last week of May, which doesn’t alter his planned timeline. Garcia has been facing live batters in the latest step in his throwing progression, and the reliever may not be far away from a minor league rehab assignment.