How Can the Blue Jays Best Fit Shane Bieber Back on the Roster?
With Shane Bieber finally nearing a return, the Blue Jays are going to have a tough decision on their hands. Who gets the boot?
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All around the league, the injury bug has been at the heart of many of the biggest storylines of the 2026 MLB season. Few teams have been hit quite as hard as the Toronto Blue Jays, though.
As of now, the Blue Jays have four position players and seven pitchers occupying spots on the injured list, including a handful of key contributors. While players like Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Kevin Gausman have been able to avoid stints on the shelf, the same has not been the case for Daulton Varsho, Alejandro Kirk, Dylan Cease, Max Scherzer, and a constantly evolving list of others.
One player that’s right on the cusp of being welcomed back to big league action is right-hander Shane Bieber, who has yet to throw a pitch this year. The 2020 AL Cy Young Award winner picked up his player option for the 2026 season but has been working his way through elbow inflammation.
It currently sounds like Bieber is going to need one more rehab start in Triple-A Buffalo before officially being activated. His most recent rehab start was a six-inning masterpiece where he didn’t allow a run and struck out five batters. Now that he’s getting close to ready, the Blue Jays are going to be faced with a tough decision.
The Debacle
The Blue Jays are in a unique position right now, because there isn’t exactly a whole lot of dead weight ready to be trimmed by a return of Bieber. Yariel Rodriguez and Connor Seabold lost their roster spots when Tommy Nance and Scherzer came off the injured list, but that left few pitchers on the roster that were obvious choices to be cut next.
So, when Cease came back, left-hander Adam Macko was the one sent back down to Triple-A. The young gun had only just made his MLB debut, but he put up a 1.50 ERA and 2.94 FIP in 12 big league outings prior to his demotion. He’ll be back up the moment someone else gets hurt, but that’s the unfortunate business side of these things.
Now, the Blue Jays’ pitching staff is made up of locks who are going nowhere, a few option-less arms, and legends who deserve better than to be simply DFA’d.
That prompts the question: just what do the Blue Jays do here?
Who Could be on the Way Out?
Patrick Corbin
Once the injuries started piling up, the Blue Jays dipped into the open market and brought in Corbin on a cheap single-year, $1 million pact. The left-hander used to be an annual candidate for an All-Star Game selection, but he’s fallen on hard times over the years.
In signing the 14-year veteran, Toronto needed precisely one thing: a warm body who can eat innings. To date, Corbin’s provided exactly that and then some. Sure, you can look at his 4.57 ERA and 98 ERA+ and feel uninspired, but he’s outperforming the vast majority of his starts dating back all the way to 2019.
His ERA+ in particular puts his overall production at just 2% below league average. For reference, he hasn’t gotten that above 96 since 2020.
To date, Corbin hasn’t had a single scoreless start for the Blue Jays, which is difficult to hide from. Still, he’s gone five or more innings in half of his starts and given this team’s pitching staff a(nother) respected veteran. That’s got to mean something, right?
We’re going to find out just how much the Blue Jays value the experience he brings to their team. He’s performed better than anybody expected him to, but is that fact alone going to be enough to keep him on the team?
Max Scherzer
Patrick Corbin is a two-time All-Star and a former World Series champion, but Scherzer, who’s about a month away from his 42nd birthday, has a whole lot more in his trophy case. Scherzer, a living legend who doesn’t really need an introduction, is an eight-time All-Star, two-time Champion, three-time Cy Young, and one of the greatest starting pitchers of all-time.
So that makes his 10.23 ERA this season come with even more baggage. The right-hander rose to prominence in last year’s postseason after stepping up when the lights are the brightest, but he’s been one of the Blue Jays’ worst-ever regular-season starters.
Scherzer’s career that spans nearly two decades speaks for itself, and you won’t find very many people saying he deserves an outright DFA. You’ll find John Schneider among the large group of people who believe Scherzer deserves a longer leash. As of now, it sounds like the Blue Jays’ decision makers are giving the pitcher the benefit of the doubt after he missed time on the injured list earlier this year.
The move here may be to have him land on the phantom injured list with some sort of very real injury he’s been fighting through for a while now. That way, he keeps a hold on his roster spot and can remain in the dugout with his teammates while being kept off the field to avoid going out on the sour note he’s been on throughout the year to this point.
Anyone who’s followed this sport since Scherzer broke into the big leagues knows he’s as tough of a competitor as you’ll find. He’s also well known as an outstanding teammate and mentor. It’s not difficult to see how he could help this Blue Jays team, who sits 34-38 but remain 1.5 GB of the final Wild Card spot, without ever throwing another pitch for them.
Simeon Woods Richardson
To many, moving on from SWR may be the most obvious choice here, but I’m not completely convinced. The right-hander came up through the Blue Jays’ system as a highly regarded prospect before being flipped to the Minnesota Twins for José Berríos, who remains employed by the Blue Jays to this day, even though he may not remain that way for long.
Woods Richardson began the year on the Twins but he was one of baseball’s worst pitchers, which led to him losing his roster spot. The Blue Jays brought him back, worked on some arsenal adjustments, and saw him make one four-scoreless-inning relief appearance for them to date.
Since his first outing as a Blue Jay, Woods Richardson has not been utilized again. He’s got no minor league options remaining, but it’d feel odd for the Jays to bring him back, spend time and effort to get him right, succeed in doing so, and then move on.
This is all without mentioning that the Blue Jays aren’t utilizing SWR as a starting pitcher. They’ve got him stashed in the bullpen. Bringing Bieber, a starter, back into the fold, should result in a fellow starter being relocated. The questionable fit comes from none of Bieber, Corbin, or Scherzer being an arm that should go to the bullpen.
The Answer to the Question is…?
It seems that Corbin, Scherzer, and Woods Richardson are the only three candidates that could realistically be shifted around, unless there’s a last minute injury elsewhere around the roster. The way this season’s gone so far, don’t write that possibility off just yet.
Crazier things have happened than a struggling pitcher coming to Toronto and finding themselves against all odds. Remember that Eric Lauer fella? He is a perfect example of how well Pete Walker and Co. can work their magic on a pitcher and help them discover value that other teams couldn’t.
If you’re asking me, I believe it’s too early for the Blue Jays to move on from SWR.
Corbin’s a serviceable starter who hasn’t been great, but he also hasn’t been awful. He’s been right around average, which is a whole lot better than Scherzer so far.
Scherzer’s missed time this year, and he’s got a spot in Cooperstown just waiting for him to become eligible down the line. He’s not a player you DFA at this point in his career.
If Bieber can come back and look like his old self, things are looking real good for the Blue Jays. To me, it feels like a Scherzer phantom IL stint makes all the sense in the world. He’s an invaluable piece for this team, but not when he’s on the mound. If there’s a way for the team to swing it, that should be how they open up a spot to welcome Bieber back into the mix.
Closing Thoughts
Slowly but surely, the Blue Jays are getting healthy again. Getting Kirk back allowed Toronto to cut bait with Tyler Heineman and roll with a Kirk-Brandon Valenzuela tandem behind the dish that should have fans salivating.
Getting Cease back gave the team a co-ace to go alongside Gausman. When they’re both on, this is one of the best one-two punches in the game.
At some point, Varsho, Addison Barger, and Yimi Garcia will be rejoining the team too. These reintroductions are going to bring about many more “who goes down?!” conversations, but these are all legitimately good “problems” to have.
That the Blue Jays have even stayed afloat this well despite all of the odds being stacked against them is a testament to the talent and depth of this roster.
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Written by
Eric Treuden (troy-din) is one of Just Baseball's Managing Editors and Facebook manager. After previous stops at FanSided's news desk, Yardbarker, and Jays Journal, he has…