{"id":662655,"date":"2026-04-04T12:25:20","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T12:25:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/662655\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T12:25:20","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T12:25:20","slug":"blue-jays-alejandro-kirk-injury-news-isnt-good-for-toronto-catcher","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/662655\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue Jays’ Alejandro Kirk injury news isn’t good for Toronto catcher"},"content":{"rendered":"

Blue Jays’ Alejandro Kirk injury news isn’t good for Toronto catcher<\/a> originally appeared on The Sporting News<\/a>. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Toronto Blue Jays<\/a> have one of the best catchers in baseball.<\/p>\n

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The short, stocky Alejandro Kirk has become a brilliant defensive player and remains a gifted batsman, as well. That’s what makes his injury on Friday so concerning.<\/p>\n

Kirk left Toronto’s game at the Chicago White Sox<\/a> in the 10th inning with a left thumb injury.<\/p>\n

A foul tip from batter Austin Hays went into the area of Kirk’s glove where that thumb resides, and Kirk left the field with trainers.<\/p>\n

Kirk underwent X-rays after the game, according to MLB.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s more the thumb. It sucks. It hurts, especially on a cold day,\u201d said Blue Jays manager John Schneider, himself a former catcher. \u201cWe\u2019re hoping that it\u2019s nothing serious. He\u2019s about as tough as they come, so for him to come out, you don\u2019t love it. It was just all thumb, no wrist.\u201d<\/p>\n

MORE:\u00a0Explaining the absurdity of 2 MLB players named Max Muncy<\/a><\/p>\n

The Blue Jays awoke Saturday awaiting the results of the scans.<\/p>\n

Kirk batted .282 last season and graded out as one of the best defensive catchers in the American League.<\/p>\n

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For Toronto to reach its best heights this season, Kirk needs to be behind the plate.<\/p>\n

MORE:\u00a0This Red Sox pitcher traveled an impossible path to the major leagues<\/a><\/p>\n

Who is the Blue Jays’ backup catcher?<\/p>\n

Tyler Heineman is Kirk’s backup, just like he was last season.<\/p>\n

Heineman made a throwing error in extra innings Friday after entering for Kirk.<\/p>\n

The Blue Jays have one other catcher on their 40-man roster: Brandon Valenzuela, who is currently at Triple-A Buffalo.<\/p>\n

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More MLB news:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Blue Jays’ Alejandro Kirk injury news isn’t good for Toronto catcher originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":662656,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2378],"tags":[3426,124,5,377,53228,2554,49,3964,1532,4,89,1414,2581,282,70,2553,15820],"class_list":{"0":"post-662655","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-blue-jays","8":"tag-alejandro-kirk","9":"tag-austin-hays","10":"tag-baseball","11":"tag-blue-jays","12":"tag-blue-jays-manager","13":"tag-bluejays","14":"tag-chicago-white-sox","15":"tag-john-schneider","16":"tag-max-muncy","17":"tag-mlb","18":"tag-red-sox","19":"tag-the-blue-jays","20":"tag-thumb-injury","21":"tag-toronto","22":"tag-toronto-blue-jays","23":"tag-torontobluejays","24":"tag-tyler-heineman"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116346429659629447","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662655","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=662655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662655\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/662656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=662655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=662655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=662655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}