UDPATE: Cease left the game with mild hamstring tightness. He’s likely set to undergo imaging shortly to see if it’s more severe than a strain.
Dylan Cease’s Sunday start against the Pirates ended early, giving the Blue Jays a sudden injury-watch situation in the middle of their series finale at Rogers Centre. Cease was done after three innings against Pittsburgh, with Toronto turning to the bullpen after the right-hander had allowed two runs on four hits and one walk while striking out six. He threw 58 pitches, 37 for strikes, and left with the Pirates ahead 2-1.
The short outing had a strange shape. Spencer Horwitz opened the game by ambushing Cease for a leadoff homer to right, and Oneil Cruz added another solo shot in the second inning. Around those two swings, Cease still had swing-and-miss stuff: he struck out Bryan Reynolds and Nick Gonzales to end the first, then punched out Brandon Lowe, Gonzales again and Cruz in the third.
There was no official diagnosis listed in the available live updates at the time of this writing, so the immediate concern is less about the box score and more about what Toronto says next. Cease entered Sunday at 3-2 with a 2.98 ERA, 57.1 innings, a 1.22 WHIP and a 3.36 strikeout-to-walk ratio, giving the Blue Jays one of the higher-strikeout arms in the American League rotation.
The timing is especially uncomfortable for Toronto. The Blue Jays came into Sunday chasing a sweep after winning four straight, while the Pirates had lost six of eight. Cease was trying to rebound from a May 19 loss to the Yankees in which he allowed five runs over five innings but still struck out nine.
For now, the next update from the Blue Jays will matter more than the final line.
