Alek Manoah’s troubles on the mound followed him all the way down to the Florida Complex League.
The Blue Jays’ struggling starter was recently demoted to rookie ball after his brutal start to the season — 6.36 ERA in 13 starts — to hit the reset button and work on his issues. However, it appears that the demotion has only added more fuel to the fire.
Making his first appearance in the Florida Complex League against the Yankees squad, the 2022 All-Star experienced more of the same except in a much more humiliating fashion.
Manoah surrendered 11 runs on 10 hits in 2 2/3 innings of work, allowing two homers — one to Roderick Arias, the Yankees’ top international signing of 2022. The lineup that the 25-year-old was lit up by had an average age of 18.8.
Five of the players in the lineup were born in 2004 or later.
It’s likely not the start that Manoah or the Blue Jays wanted as the former ace was looking to regain his form. The right-hander entered this season with the reputation of being one of the best young starting pitchers in the game.
In his first two seasons, Manoah registered ERA’s of 3.22 and 2.44 (which was good for a third-place finish in the American League Cy Young award voting last season).
Manager John Schneider hoped that whatever the organization decided to do in terms of a demotion would get his promising starter back to his dominant form.
“[We’re] doing everything we can do for him means using every resource that we have, using the staff and using his teammates to help him through it,” the Blue Jays’ skipper said on June 5. “When I say that everything is on the table, yeah, everything is. We’re just trying to help him get back to the caliber of pitcher that he was. …
“We’ve got to continue to do what’s best for him to help him get better. That’s what we’re going to do, starting tonight and moving forward. That’s been our focus the whole time, so we’ll continue to do that.”
The right-hander surrendered six runs on seven hits while getting just one out before he was pulled in the top of the first in his last big league outing against the Houston Astros on June 5.
It seems that Manoah still has plenty of work cut out for him with a bunch of teenagers having their way with him on the mound as the road back to the big leagues may be longer and bumpier than originally expected.
