{"id":664047,"date":"2026-04-05T04:52:30","date_gmt":"2026-04-05T04:52:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/664047\/"},"modified":"2026-04-05T04:52:30","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T04:52:30","slug":"blue-jays-alejandro-kirk-out-with-thumb-fracture-as-injuries-pile-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/664047\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue Jays&#8217; Alejandro Kirk out with thumb fracture as injuries pile up"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The injuries are piling up for the Blue Jays.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>All-Star catcher Alejandro Kirk was placed on the injured list Saturday after dislocating and breaking his left thumb, which he suffered on a foul tip during Friday\u2019s game against the White Sox.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He is set to meet with a specialist to determine if surgery is needed.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>After the game, Kirk was feeling about as one would expect.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.45248227;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"38993044\" width=\"857\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/alejandro-kirk-30-toronto-blue-124626307.jpg\" alt=\"Alejandro Kirk, wearing a white &quot;Blue Jays&quot; uniform, runs on a baseball field.\" class=\"wp-image-38993044\"  \/>Alejandro Kirk #30 of the Toronto Blue Jays hits a home run against the Athletics during the ninth inning in their MLB game at the Rogers Centre on March 28, 2026 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s all right, as [Kirk] can be,\u201d Toronto manager John Schneider said, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/story\/_\/id\/48395146\/blue-jays-place-alejandro-kirk-10-day-il-thumb-fracture\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">per ESPN<\/a>. \u201cHe\u2019s pissed, obviously. Tough news for us and for Kirky for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Kirk has been one of the best backstops in baseball, making two All-Star appearances and winning the 2022 Silver Slugger since taking over full-time behind the plate for the Blue Jays four years ago.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Last season, Kirk hit .282\/.348\/.421 with 15 homers in 130 games.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He was one of the Blue Jays\u2019 biggest bats during their American League pennant-winning run in October, hitting .254\/.349\/.493 with five long balls.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Tyler Heineman and Brandon Valenzuela are expected to split time at catcher in Kirk\u2019s absence.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Kirk\u2019s thumb issue adds to a long list of injuries the Blue Jays are dealing with during the early going of the 2026 season.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>The team began the year with starting pitchers Shane Bieber (right elbow inflammation), Jos\u00e9 Berr\u00edos (right elbow stress fracture) and Trey Yesavage (right shoulder impingement) on the injured list.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this week, starter <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/03\/31\/sports\/blue-jays-cody-ponce-to-miss-significant-time-after-injuring-acl\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Cody Ponce went down with an ACL injury<\/a> while trying to field a ground ball, which is expected to sideline him for a significant amount of time.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Blue Jays are sitting at 4-3 on the season heading into Saturday\u2019s play despite the injuries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The injuries are piling up for the Blue Jays.\u00a0 All-Star catcher Alejandro Kirk was placed on the injured&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":664048,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2378],"tags":[5,377,2554,4,185,282,70,2553],"class_list":{"0":"post-664047","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-blue-jays","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-blue-jays","10":"tag-bluejays","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-toronto","14":"tag-toronto-blue-jays","15":"tag-torontobluejays"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116350311861898914","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664047","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=664047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664047\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/664048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}