TORONTO -- What does Trey Yesavage have in store for his second act? How can he clear the bar he’s already set so high?
Yesavage is the pitching prospect we’ll compare big-league debuts to forever in Toronto. There are Blue Jays pitching prospects who haven’t even been born yet who will be compared to him. If this organization’s “ace of the future” has a hot debut in the year 2049, we’ll be reaching back to compare their numbers to what Yesavage did in 2025.
It’s not fair, then, to ask Yesavage for more. It’s unrealistic, and if we turn in the other direction to look backwards, baseball teaches us over and over again that the hard part isn’t making a grand first impression. It’s the encore and all of the encores that follow.
Pitching prospects are skyrocketing to the big leagues with better stuff than ever before, and many of them will dominate early. Those who stick in the big leagues for 10-plus years, though, are the ones who master their routines and win the never-ending game of cat and mouse.
Yesavage’s 2026 debut was a fine start on this second act. Tuesday night against the Red Sox, Yesavage wasn’t setting rookie records or overwhelming the Boston hitters, but those days will come. It’s almost more encouraging to see that Yesavage can shut down a lineup without striking out half the hitters he faces. Hot rookies have a great ‘A’ game. The pitchers who stick around this league have a great ‘B’ game, too.
Over 5 1/3 innings, Yesavage struck out just three batters but kept his pitch count to 74. His splitter wasn’t turning hitters inside out like it did in 2025, but he was spotting pitches well and avoided hard contact. Pair this type of outing with his dominant ones -- which will still come -- and this is the path to Yesavage sustaining his success in the big leagues.
There’s no element of surprise anymore. Yesavage was the breakout star of the Blue Jays’ World Series run and came into 2026 as a favorite to win AL Rookie of the Year. This, now, is the hard part.
“Hitters are going to make adjustments. The relative unknown and the uniqueness of his delivery will go away at some point,” John Schneider said. “He’s going to have to make adjustments to it. That’s what we’re looking for and trying to stay ahead of with him.”
These shorter outings could be part of that plan. This first start back landed at just 74 pitches because Yesavage isn’t 100% built up just yet, but when you look at his workload across all five levels last season from Single-A to the big leagues, there’s a blueprint for how the Blue Jays can handle this.
Last year, Yesavage made a start on “regular rest” just three times. There were plenty of instances with an extra day or two of rest, which will still happen often, but also so many other variables that made his 2025 season abnormal.
“He was bouncing between affiliates, there were games he was pitching out of the bullpen and there were games that were shorter. There were just different areas of rest in between,” Schneider said. “That’s the biggest thing. You’re a Major League pitcher now for almost a full season.
“How are you going to navigate that? How are you going to know when it’s time to take a breather or when it’s time to step on the gas a little bit? Routines are huge. That’s why we talk about it all the time with our Minor League guys.”
Get used to that word, “routines.”
Routines aren’t exciting, but they’re the difference between a great rookie season and a great career. We already know that Yesavage is capable of greatness. Can he do it again? And again? And again?