Age Is Just a Number: Young Blue Jays Pitchers Embracing High-Leverage Roles

With a three-game lead over the Yankees in the American League East and just 19 contests to play in the regular season, conversations about the Blue Jays have moved from where they'll end up in the standings to what challenges lie ahead as they prepare to make a run to the World Series. Most of the attention the team has been receiving has centered around the club's explosive offence and the acquisition of David Price, two ingredients that have powered Toronto to a 32-9 stretch. But improvements in the team's bullpen should not be overlooked, especially the decision to move Aaron Sanchez and Roberto Osuna into the eighth- and ninth-inning roles. The pair of young pitchers have made a significant impact in stabilizing an area of concern earlier in the season. After leading the league in blown saves during the first month of the season, the Jays own the lowest bullpen ERA in the AL post All-Star Game.

Osuna pitched at Class A Advanced Dunedin last season after having Tommy John surgery in 2013. A non-roster invitee at spring training, Osuna made the Opening Day roster, and has since been handed the responsibility of closing games for a Jays team playing meaningful baseball in September for the first time since before he was born. The Jays are asking a lot from the 20-year-old rookie, not that he seems to think so. "I don't think like that," Osuna said. "I'm a little bit different. I see the ninth inning the same as the sixth, seventh or the eighth. I don't care what the situation is. Whether the bases are loaded, or if there's nobody on, when I get into the game, I'm just trying to make good pitches and get these guys out of the way."

Since moving into the closer's role, Osuna has only blown one save, which came in early September against Cleveland. The Jays closer has a 2.02 ERA and is striking out 9.82 batters per nine innings over 62 1/3 frames. LaTroy Hawkins, a teammate who's seen Osuna up close for over a month, has been impressed. "He has it in his blood," Hawkins said, referencing Roberto's uncle Antonio, who pitched for 11 seasons as a reliever in the major leagues. "The arm speed. His makeup. It's all there."

For Sanchez, the team's set-up man, the path has been a little different. Sanchez made his major league debut last season at age 22, making 24 relief appearances after a July call-up and impressing the Jays with a 1.09 ERA and 27 strikeouts in 33 innings. "It was all new to me last year," Sanchez said. Before joining the big league club, he pitched in 22 games combined at the Double-A and Triple-A levels in 2014, all but two of them as a starter. "I had my challenges. I had to understand how to keep my offspeed pitches sharp and keep a feel for them. The hardest thing was getting used to the routine. The mindset is also a little different." Sanchez has seen his role with the team change dramatically since spring training, when an injury to Marcus Stroman moved him into the rotation where he made 11 starts before hitting the disabled list in early June with a strained lat muscle. When he returned, Sanchez was moved to the bullpen, where he has made 21 appearances and held opponents to a .113 batting average. Prior to the weekend series against the Yankees, he had allowed run in just two of those appearances.

Sanchez is clear about his desire to be a starter in the long term. For now, he's embracing the role that's been given to him. "I like when the ball is in my hands in those situations where the game is on the line." Sanchez said. "For some people, it's not easy. I think you do need a certain mentality to come out and pitch late in games, but I would be lying to you if I said I wasn't nervous every time those bullpen gates swing open."

One of the more nervous nights for Sanchez this season came August 14. The Jays—having swept a three-game series at Yankee Stadium the weekend prior—opened a critical three-game set at the Rogers Centre against New York. Leading 3–0 in the eighth, the Yankees finally broke a 33 1/3 inning scoreless drought against the Jays. Still up by two runs, John Gibbons removed David Price from the game and summoned Sanchez to face pinch-hitter Carlos Beltran with two runners on. The result, a go-ahead three-run homer by Beltran, is probably still fresh on the minds of Toronto fans who got to witness a sold-out crowd in Toronto create what players afterward called a playoff atmosphere.

"It was my first time pitching in front of 50,000 people. I was definitely a little excited," Sanchez said. "My first fastball was up in the zone and he swung through it. I went back to it and he swung through it again. That wasn't really the scouting report we had on Beltran, but something I saw on the fly. My thing was trying to stay up on him. Obviously, it didn't work on that last pitch."

A moment like that can have an extended impact on a reliever, a thought reinforced to me as I re-watched highlights from the 2001 World Series shown at Yankee Stadium over the weekend of Byung-Hyun Kim allowing a game-tying home run and walk-off blast in back-to-back games. Two days after the Beltran home run, Sanchez entered the eighth inning with a two-run lead against the Yankees and pitched a perfect inning. In fact, after the crucial mistake to the Yankees pinch hitter, Sanchez made nine consecutive appearances without allowing a run.

"Once the final out is made, you move on," Sanchez said. "I learn from my mistakes, you move on. You understand that not every night is what you want it to be—if you get caught up in the past it's going to eat away at you."

Osuna has already embraced that mindset.

"If you couldn't do it today, and you're still thinking about it tomorrow, you won't do too much in this league," Osuna said.

Hawkins, who believes in calling them lessons learned instead of mistakes, has a more matter-of-fact way of looking at it, a perspective that comes with having seen all the highs and lows. "We've all been there," Hawkins said. "But there young guys don't have a lot of history. And there are a lot of seasoned hitters in this league and they will take advantage of you if you're not ready."

If there's another pitcher in the clubhouse who may be able to provide some advice, it would be Price, who as a rookie in 2008 made his major league debut with the Tampa Bay Rays in September and pitched out of the bullpen during the team's run to the World Series. Sanchez hasn't picked Price's brain yet on the topic, but he plans to. "I want to sit down and talk to him about it," Sanchez said. "One of these days, when we're having dinner or hanging out, we'll talk."

In the first game of Saturday's doubleheader at Yankee Stadium, the young bullpen duo took center stage in the late innings. Sanchez entered in the seventh and retired the side in order. With the Jays leading 5-4, Gibbons tried to get one more inning out of his set-up man in the eighth, the first time he's asked Sanchez to go multiple innings since his move back to the bullpen. It didn't work out. Sanchez walked Jacoby Ellsbury and Brett Garner to start the inning, and was lifted for Brett Cecil who allowed the tying run to score. Osuna entered the game with runners on the corners and walked Alex Rodriguez to load the bases. With the game in the balance, the Jays closer got Chase Headley to pop out, and induced a grounder from Greg Bird and got out of the inning unscathed thanks to a remarkable defensive play from Cliff Pennington. The Jays would win the game in extra innings.

As we get deeper into September and into the postseason, these high-leverage situations with games and series on the balance will cast an even brighter spotlight on the talented young duo in the Jays bullpen. Sanchez and Osuna understand the challenge, not that it's an area of focus whatsoever.

"I don't think it comes to our minds," Sanchez said. "We get it. I think we put more pressure on ourselves than anyone else."

Osuna's formula to succeed is simple.

"We have a big role and we're young guys," Osuna said. "If we make good pitches, with the stuff we've got? We're going to be OK."