BWDIK: Jenkins, Robinson, Romano, Soroka, Toro, Wells
By Kevin Glew
Cooperstowners in Canada
My weekly observations and notes about some Canadian baseball stories:
– Canadian right-hander Jordan Romano (Markham, Ont.) injured the middle finger on his throwing hand in the eighth inning of the Toronto Blue Jays’ game against the Baltimore Orioles on Friday. After retiring the first two batters he faced, Romano gave up a game-tying home run to Orioles first baseman Renato Nunez and then started flexing his right hand when facing the following batter, Jose Iglesias. He told manager Charlie Montoyo that his middle finger went numb. He has been placed on the 10-day injured list with a right middle finger strain. Romano, an Ontario Blue Jays and Junior National Team alum, has been the Blue Jays’ best reliever this season. In 15 appearances, spanning 14 2/3 innings, he is 2-1 with a 1.23 ERA and has 21 strikeouts.
– Fellow Canuck right-hander Mike Soroka (Calgary, Alta.), who tore his right Achilles tendon on August 3, provided an update on his injury in a virtual press conference on Wednesday. The 23-year-old Atlanta Braves’ ace, who’s out for the season, said that “everything was feeling great” after his surgery which took place on August 7 in Green Bay, Wisc. Soroka mentioned that he would be a in cast for nine more days and then the cast would be replaced by a boot. He indicated that the first four months of rehabilitation are “regimented” but he was hoping to return to the Braves’ rotation sooner than expected. Experts say it generally takes nine-to-12 months to recover from this type of injury. Soroka was making his third start of the season when the injury occurred. In his rookie campaign in 2019, he went 13-4 with a 2.68 ERA in 29 starts and finished second in the National League Rookie of the Year voting.
– If you’ve ever wondered what awards Canadian baseball legend Fergie Jenkins (Chatham, Ont.) has on display in his house, he offered a peak on Twitter this week (See video below). For those in Southwestern Ontario that want a closer look at a Jenkins’ 1971 National League Cy Young Award, it’s on display at the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame in St. Marys, Ontario which is only open until Friday. So if you’re going to make a trip to the museum, make it this week.
– I’ve written much about Jackie Robinson’s season with the Montreal Royals in 1946 before he broke Major League Baseball’s colour barrier. What I didn’t know until I read this excellent article by Ian Wilson at Alberta Dugout Stories was that Jackie Robinson paid a memorable trip to Calgary and surrounding area in 1955 after the Brooklyn Dodgers won the World Series. You can read all about it here.
– This year has been far too full of challenges and heartbreaks, but my heart broke again on Friday when I heard that Chadwick Boseman, who so beautifully portrayed Jackie Robinson in the 2013 movie “42,” had died of colon cancer at the age of 43. Reports indicate he had been privately battling the disease for four years. The photo below of him with Jackie Robinson’s widow, Rachel, after the premiere of the movie in 2013 is so moving that I felt I needed to share it.
Photo: Kevin Winter/Getty Images
– The good news about Longueuil, Quebec native Abraham Toro’s 2020 season is that he has clubbed three home runs, which is one more than he hit in 25 games with the Houston Astros last season. The bad news is that he has just five other hits and is hitting .143 in 56 at bats. Toro has been the Astros’ DH for much of the season before starting at third base in recent days. After batting a combined .324 with 17 home runs and a .527 slugging percentage in 114 games in double-A and triple-A in the Astros’ organization last season, the switch-hitting 23-year-old made his big league debut on August 22, 2019. In 25 games for the American League pennant winners, he batted .218 with two home runs. One of his homers was a two-run shot at Rogers Centre that accounted for the only two runs in Justin Verlander’s no-hitter against the Blue Jays on September 1.
– Twenty-one years ago today, Vernon Wells made his major league debut for the Blue Jays. Batting second and playing centre field, the then 20-year-old went 0-for-3 in the Blue Jays’ 2-1 win over the Minnesota Twins at Rogers Centre. Wells, of course, went on to play parts of 12 big league seasons with the Blue Jays and ranks second in franchise history in hits (1,529), doubles (339), extra-base hits (592) and total bases (2,597).
– It was 36 years ago today that the Montreal Expos fired manager Bill Virdon after the club had posted a disappointing 64-67 record during the 1984 season. They replaced him with Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame inductee Jim Fanning. It was Fanning’s second tenure as manager with the club. He had previously guided the Expos to their only postseason appearance in 1981. After taking over in 1984, Fanning led the Expos to a 14-16 record down the stretch.
– Want to feel old? Blue Jays’ 2002 first-round pick Russ Adams turns 40 today. It seems like just yesterday that general manager J.P. Ricciardi was trumpeting Adams (who was Ricciardi’s first pick as Blue Jays’ GM) as a cornerstone of the team’s future. The young shortstop’s big league career got off to a promising start when he hit .304 with four home runs in 22 games at the end of the 2004 season. The following year, he served largely as the club’s leadoff hitter and batted .258 with a .325 on-base percentage in 139 games. His production dropped off after that and he suited up for his final eight big league games with the club in 2009.