Toronto Blue Jays starting pitcher Alek Manoah throws the ball against the Boston Red Sox, in Toronto on Sept. 30. Manoah will get the start for Game 1 of Toronto's wild-card series against the Seattle Mariners Friday.Christopher Katsarov/The Canadian Press
As Alek Manoah readies to pitch at a raucous Rogers Centre for the first Blue Jays home playoff game since 2016, it’s easy to forget that this is his first full major-league season.
The unruffled 24-year-old was the obvious choice to start Game 1, as the Jays open the postseason with a best-of-three wild-card series against the Seattle Mariners.
The 6-foot-8 right-hander from Homestead, Fla., became Toronto’s undisputed ace this season, but also one of the best pitchers in baseball. He led the Jays with 16 wins (and seven losses) and a 2.24 earned-run average – fourth-best in the big leagues. Manoah’s stellar 0.88 ERA for September was the lowest in a single month for any pitcher in franchise history. He played in his first All-Star Game, and now he’s set to make his playoff debut.
This was the first season the young pitcher opened with the big-league club and stayed all year. The Jays drafted him 11th overall in 2019, out of West Virginia University. He pitched in just nine minor-league games before earning his big-league call-up and then dazzled in his major-league debut at Yankee Stadium on May 27, 2021. He wasted no time cementing his spot in the Jays’ rotation.
Manoah pitched 196 2/3 innings in 2022 – 85 more than last season. In 31 starts, he helped a team that missed the playoffs by one game last year to clinch this time.
Manoah, speaking before a full news conference at Thursday’s workout day in Toronto as the postseason hoopla began, said he isn’t worried about emotionally overheating Friday. He doesn’t try to temper the nerves or the fervour.
“Let the adrenalin run,” Manoah said. “I truly feel like that’s when I’m at my best.”
He was asked if he has ever felt pressure playing baseball and had an uncomplicated answer.
“My high-school coach used to say ‘pressure is something you put in your tires’. It’s just a game, just go out there and have some fun and leave the pressure for your tires.”
Manoah said he reflected on his career’s journey with his mother this week, over a FaceTime call. They reminisced about all those youth baseball road trips to tournaments, with the family criss-crossing Florida – the peanut butter sandwiches along the way, the early morning departures and late-night returns, with mom still making it to work on time early the next morning.
He got wild-card tickets for his group of 25 family members.
“The whole family’s in town. That’s my support group. They’re the reason I am where I am today. I wouldn’t want to [play] without them by my side.”
Manoah always prompts a whoop of applause as he makes his way to left field, to warm up before every start at Rogers Centre. His routine is meticulous. He walks out, jacket zipped up, with a football tucked under one arm and carrying a small bag full of elastic exercise bands he uses to stretch.
He playfully tosses a football to start, with Jays bullpen catcher Alex Andreopoulos. Eventually they switch to a baseball, and the distance between the two keeps increasing, with Manoah stepping further backward with each throw, until he has crept all the way into right field. He casts long, looping throws clear across the width of the vast green outfield. Before he works his way back in, he gets down on knee for a few minutes alone. He and all-star catcher Alejandro Kirk warm up in the bullpen and walk together to the Jays dugout, with the team’s other starters walking in a line behind him.
“Feels like he’s been ready for this moment since he signed,” said Jays interim manager John Schneider. “He lives for moments like this and embraces everything that comes with it.”
On Friday, he’ll face Luis Castillo of Seattle, making its first postseason appearance since 2001. The Mariners went 5-2 against Toronto this season.
Manoah’s confidence is obvious, but simultaneously endearing, rather than boastful. It comes out in many things he says. Asked if star Houston Astros pitcher Justin Verlander had given him any advice about playoff baseball when they spoke at the All-Star Game, Manoah said he hadn’t, and added this gem: “I don’t know if he’d give me the right advice anyway, since we’ll probably be seeing him in the next round.”
For inspiration, Manoah said he’s been watching video of Edwin Encarnacion’s extra-innings walk-off homer in 2016 that helped the Jays beat the Baltimore Orioles in the single-elimination wild-card game and advance to the American League Division Series. It gives him a sense of what Rogers Centre will be like in the postseason.
“That video came up on my Twitter feed and I couldn’t believe the energy and the atmosphere,” Manoah said. “The building was shaking, man. So I’ve been using that to feel some of that energy that’s going to be there [Friday].”