Arden Zwelling

We have to keep this to two.

And so we have to go to our absolute best option.

Ideally, you're not using a guy like Louis Varland in that spot.

Ideally, you're saving him for...

when the game is tied or you're ahead.

I mean, he pitched on Tuesday night, and it's now Wednesday afternoon, and you're bringing him back in a seventh-inning spot where you're down two.

So I think that speaks a bit to the urgency with which John Schneider has to manage right now when his offense isn't clicking, when he says, all right, I've got to use my absolute best arm here to keep this deficit to just two.

Otherwise, my chances of winning deplete precipitously.

So when I see sure-handed players like Ernie Clement making inaccurate throws in Tampa and Andres Jimenez making some inaccurate throws in Minneapolis, when I see Brandon Valenzuela trying to tag from first to second and getting thrown out, when I see...

Challenges getting burned to the point that Blue Jays don't have one left in the third inning.

When I see the chase rate for players being up close to 50% for the team being the highest in baseball, I think those could be reflections of players...

putting too much pressure on themselves to get out of this and doing the opposite of what Max Scherzer is saying and not just waiting for the little opportunities and not just taking the little wins, but trying to be the hero every time that they're up.

And, you know, to borrow a tortured analogy, like gripping the stick too tight and trying to do too much.

Where do you stand on that?

Time for a game of how silver is this lining?

And the first topic is going to be the fact that the Blue Jays have essentially the same record that they had at this point in both 2025 and 2024.

How silver do you think that lining is for the 2025 Blue Jays?

Yeah, I think the 2025 Blue Jays started the season poorly, and the 2026 Blue Jays have also started the season poorly, and the 2024 Blue Jays also started the season poorly, right?

And the rest of the season from this point forward for the 2024 Blue Jays and 2025 Blue Jays went in pretty disparate directions, I'm sure people can remember.

So it really doesn't tell us anything about what's going to happen next.