TORONTO \u2014 Pitcher Eric Lauer has done a little bit of everything for the Toronto Blue Jays since his season debut seven weeks ago.<\/p>\n
The 30-year-old left-hander has worked in short relief, served in a bulk role and is now used as a spot starter.<\/p>\n
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He has been getting results every step of the way.<\/p>\n
Lauer was in top form Wednesday night, allowing one earned run over five-plus innings in an 8-1 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks at Rogers Centre.<\/p>\n
“He has been really damn good,” said Blue Jays manager John Schneider.<\/p>\n
Lauer (3-1) had a season-high eight strikeouts and allowed four hits and a walk. Over his last five appearances, he has given up three earned runs over 19 innings and held opponents to a .136 average.<\/p>\n
He credits fastball command for his solid performance this season.<\/p>\n
“Speeding guys up, slowing them down, moving them in and out and up and down \u2014 that’s pitching to me,” Lauer said. “To me, I’m a pitcher. I’ve never been an overpowering guy. I’ve never been just a stuff guy. I’m not going to out-stuff people.<\/p>\n
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“But I think I can make my pitches play up better than they actually are based on how I can throw my fastball.”<\/p>\n
Bo Bichette hit a leadoff homer off Eduardo Rodriguez (2-4) and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. drove in three runs for the Blue Jays (40-33), who will go for a three-game sweep Thursday afternoon.<\/p>\n
Bichette and Addison Barger had three hits apiece while Guerrero reached base five times. He had a single, double and three walks.<\/p>\n
Toronto has won 11 of its last 12 home games and earned 14 victories over its last 19 games overall.<\/p>\n
Lauer threw five shutout frames before he was pulled after giving up a leadoff triple to Corbin Carroll in the sixth.<\/p>\n
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With Yariel Rodriguez on in relief, Carroll scored the lone run for Arizona (36-37) on a groundout by Lourdes Gurriel Jr.<\/p>\n
Toronto answered with three runs in the bottom half of the inning and broke the game open with a three-run seventh. The Blue Jays improved to 15-8 in interleague play.<\/p>\n
Lauer has made four starts this season in a rotation anchored by veteran right-handers Kevin Gausman, Jose Berrios and Chris Bassitt.<\/p>\n
Max Scherzer made only one start due to a thumb issue and Bowden Francis was mostly ineffective before landing on the IL this week due to a shoulder impingement.<\/p>\n
Lauer has filled in admirably when needed and has likely earned himself a temporary spot in the five-man mix.<\/p>\n
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“Over the course of the year, your depth is going to get tested,” Schneider said. “So to have a guy like him step up has been awesome.”<\/p>\n
A first-round pick (No. 25 overall) by San Diego in 2016, Lauer made his big-league debut with the Padres in 2018.<\/p>\n
He later spent parts of four seasons with the Milwaukee Brewers before splitting last year between Triple-A and the Korean league.<\/p>\n
Lauer signed a minor-league deal with the Blue Jays last December and his contract was selected from Triple-A Buffalo on April 30.<\/p>\n
Since then, he has posted an impressive 2.29 earned-run average over 10 appearances with 36 strikeouts against just 11 walks.<\/p>\n
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“Your best ability is availability,” Lauer said. “So I just try to go out there and do my job every time I’m called.”<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 18, 2025.<\/p>\n
Gregory Strong, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO \u2014 Pitcher Eric Lauer has done a little bit of everything for the Toronto Blue Jays since…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":114586,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2378],"tags":[6081,22,5,377,2554,88,754,82,1538,756,1497,3964,387,389,1447,381,59,4,43,137,1414,282,70,2553,93],"class_list":{"0":"post-114585","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-blue-jays","8":"tag-addison-barger","9":"tag-arizona-diamondbacks","10":"tag-baseball","11":"tag-blue-jays","12":"tag-bluejays","13":"tag-bo-bichette","14":"tag-bowden-francis","15":"tag-chris-bassitt","16":"tag-corbin-carroll","17":"tag-eduardo-rodriguez","18":"tag-eric-lauer","19":"tag-john-schneider","20":"tag-jose-berrios","21":"tag-kevin-gausman","22":"tag-lourdes-gurriel-jr","23":"tag-max-scherzer","24":"tag-milwaukee-brewers","25":"tag-mlb","26":"tag-padres","27":"tag-san-diego","28":"tag-the-blue-jays","29":"tag-toronto","30":"tag-toronto-blue-jays","31":"tag-torontobluejays","32":"tag-vladimir-guerrero-jr"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/114707973050360030","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}