After posting his best year in 2022, where he was an All-Star and finished third in the AL Cy Young race, former West Virginia and current Toronto Blue Jays starter Alek Manoah has simply not been the same on the mound.
Manoah started 31 games in 2022, tossing 196.2 innings and striking out 180 batters with a 2.24 ERA. Many had high hopes for the 6-foot-6 righty heading into 2023, but Manoah’s year did not go how he or the organization could have imagined.
Last year, in his age-25 season, Manoah started 19 games, throwing 87.1 innings, with 79 strikeouts and a much higher 5.87 ERA. He was sent down at a point in the year to figure out his ‘stuff’, but simply had the same struggles.
Manoah started his 2024 campaign on the IL, dealing with right shoulder tightness. He started one game in spring training, where he faced 11 batters, pitching 1.2 innings allowing four earned runs on three hits, three batters hit by pitch and one walk. He did not pick up any strikeouts.
On Sunday, Manoah made his first rehab assignment of the year for Toronto’s single-A Dunedin team, who former Mountaineer Braden Barry plays for and it did not go so well. Manoah walked four consecutive batters to begin his outing, throwing just two strikes on his first 18 pitches. He ended his day pitching 1.2 innings, allowing seven runs, six earned including one home run.
Control has always been an issue for the righty, he led the league in batters hit by pitch in 2021 with 16 and in 2022 with 15. Manoah will get the ball a few more times before his return if he returns to major league action. The Blue Jays have to hope that their former first-round pick figures it out and returns to form when he was considered one of the best pitchers in the league, but for now Manoah will need to take it batter by batter as he works toward a possible return.
