Two hitters hit their first home runs at a new level. Dasan Brown his his first AAA home run and JR Freethy his first at AA. NH scored seven runs on their way to a win to finish out a disappointing 56-81 campaign. Buffalo fell a run short. I also took a look at the origins of the Jays major league bullpen.

Buffalo 4 Rochester 5

Chesapeake 3 New Hampshire 7

Three Stars

Third Star - Grant Rogers

Second Star - Ryan McCarty

First Star - JR Freethy

Boxes

NOTES

Buffalo went down 5-1 early but scored a single run in the sixth, eighth and ninth but fell just short at 5-4. Dasan Brown hit his first AAA home run, Brandon Valenzuela hit his third with the Bisons. Michael Stefanic had two hits, Riley Tirotta tripled and RJ Schreck doubled.

CJ Van Eyk made his second start against Rochester this week and he gave up five runs in four innings. Lazaro EStrada followed with 2.2 innings. Estrada was last optioned by the Jays on July 30th. A horrible August followed with a 9.30 ERA. He moved to the bullpen and has pitched better with a 1.00 ERA in nine August/September relief innings.

New Hampshire had a big five run fourth inning on their way to a win. Damiano Palmegiani started things off with a triple. Jevon Ward followed with an RBI single. Peyton Williams then doubled, Ryan McCarty singled and JR Freethy hit his first AA home run, a three run shot. McCarty added a two run homer in the eighth. Ward, Williams, McCarty and Freethy each had two hits.

Grant Rogers, like Van Eyk, had to face the hitters for the second time in a week. He did it better, six innings, two runs, five K's. Rogers has been the cornerstone of the AA rotation since May. While hot shots like Yesavage and Stanifer have breezed in, Rogers made 20 starts with a 4.07 ERA, in 14 of those starts he gave up three runs or less. A job well done.

I was listening to a BA podcast this week and it got me thinking about relief pitchers and where they start out as pros. I looked at 17 relievers who have pitched in the Jays bullpen this season. I was wondering how they came to the major league bullpen. Some were major league starters and most were minor league starters.

Jeff Hoffman has made the most major league starts from the bullpen guys and the most minor league starts. Hoffman has 50 major league starts and 95 minor league ones. Several players have made around 20 starts in the majors. Chad Green was at 24, Louis Varland and Yariel Rodriguez 22 and Ryan Borucki 21. Eric Swanson had eleven. Several players were in single digits, likely as openers.

The most minor league starts after Hoffman is 82 by Borucki. Chad Green, Paxton Schultz and Varland are in the 70's. Eric Swanson is at 65, Dillon Tate 60 and Seranthony Dominguez 57. Jacob Barnes made 48 and Brendon Little 41. Yimi Garcia and Braydon Fisher just made it into double digits.

That leaves five pitchers who are bullpen only guys, mostly. That's about 30% of Jays relievers who made it by being exclusively relievers versus 70% who started as starters including some who made it to the majors as a starter.

Tommy Nance made six starts in the minors, Justin Bruihl 3, Ryan Burr 2 and Nick Sandlin one. But the one pitcher who has never started is Mason Fluharty. And in three college seasons he never started. He is unique on the Blue Jays.