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Right-hander Max Scherzer and the Toronto Blue Jays are in agreement on a one-year, $15.5 million contract, sources told ESPN on Thursday, uniting the future Hall of Famer with a Toronto team trying to salvage the winter after missing on high-profile free-agent pursuits.
The 40-year-old Scherzer, one of the best pitchers of his generation and a future first-ballot Hall of Famer, is coming off an injury-plagued season with the Texas Rangers in which he made just nine starts and went 2-4 with a 3.95 ERA. He didn’t make his first start until June 23 following surgery in the offseason to repair a herniated disk in his back. He then missed all of August with shoulder fatigue, returning to make one start in September before a hamstring injury ended his season.
Toronto nevertheless will slot Scherzer into its rotation, pending a physical, and add to what was already a strength, with veterans Kevin Gausman, Jose Berrios and Chris Bassitt, plus Bowden Francis, who was one of the best pitchers in baseball down the stretch in 2024.
The Blue Jays had aimed to sign multiple nine-figure players this winter, going after outfielder Juan Soto and starters Corbin Burnes and Max Fried. Each opted to sign elsewhere, as did Roki Sasaki, the 23-year-old Japanese star who’s now No. 1 on Kiley McDaniel’s Top 100 prospect list for ESPN. Toronto did strike a five-year, $92.5 million deal with outfielder Anthony Santander to bolster its outfield, and in Scherzer, it adds a veteran whose postseason experience should help if the Blue Jays can navigate the American League East gauntlet.
Once a durable workhorse who made 30-plus starts each season from 2009 through 2018, Scherzer has now missed significant time each of the past three seasons, making 23 starts in 2022 while missing time with an oblique strain and making 27 starts in 2023 due to a strained shoulder and back spasms.
While Scherzer’s fastball took a step back last year, he wields a five-pitch arsenal and will rely on control that has been a hallmark throughout his 17-year career. His strikeout rate last year dropped to 22.6%, down from 28%, and well below his 2021-22 seasons, when he was over 30%. He allowed a .724 OPS, higher than the MLB average of .711.
Scherzer was a free agent for the third time in his career. Ahead of the 2015 season, he agreed to a seven-year, $210 million contract with the Washington Nationals that proved to be one of the best signings ever for a free-agent pitcher. Scherzer won the second and third Cy Young Awards of his career, finished in the top three in three other seasons and helped the Nationals win the World Series in 2019, going 3-0 with a 2.40 ERA that postseason and starting Game 7 of the World Series while pitching through a neck injury.
He was traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2021 in the final year of that contract and then signed a three-year deal, $130 million deal with the New York Mets, the highest annual average value for a player at the time (matched a year later by Justin Verlander and then surpassed by Shohei Ohtani in 2024). The Mets made the playoffs that first year as Scherzer posted a 2.23 ERA, but he was traded to the Rangers in 2023 — and helped them to a World Series title, although injuries limited him to just 9.2 innings in three postseason starts (he did pitch three scoreless innings in his one World Series start).
The eight-time All-Star is 216-112 in his career with the three Cy Young Awards and 75.4 WAR. Among active pitchers, only Verlander has more wins and only Verlander and Clayton Kershaw have a higher WAR.
The New York Post first reported the agreement between Scherzer and the Blue Jays.
ESPN’s David Schoenfield contributed to this report.