Toronto Blue Jays Receive Tremendous Update on Health of Former All-Star Ace

The Toronto Blue Jays are a game below .500 and three games back from first place in the American League East behind the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox.

After getting off to a solid start in the first couple weeks of the season, things have taken a rather unfortunate turn in the next half of the month.

A massive part of the reason why the team was performing well earlier in the season was a starting rotation which was performing out of its mind.

Guys like Chris Bassitt and Kevin Gausman who got off to sensational starts to the season have started to cool off and it's no coincidence that as a result, more tallies are popping up in ths loss column.

Though Toronto does not have a horrible rotation by any means, it can always be added to, and it just so happens they have the pending addition which could put it over the top waiting in the wings and getting healthier every day.

According to a report from Arden Zwelling of Sportsnet, young right-handed ace Alek Manoah Dunedin is progressing nicely through his rehab in Dunedin. Manoah is regularly throwing bullpens and getting closer and closer to return from Tommy John surgery.

Zwelling's report states that Manoah is still on track to return sometime in the second half of the 2025 season after making five starts last year and undergoing the procedure in June.

If Manoah could somehow get back to his form from the 2022 season, it would provide an indescribably massive boost to the ceiling of this ball club.

That year, the 27-year-old tossed a career-high 196.2 innings and pitched to a 2.24 ERA and 0.992 WHIP with a 16-7 record, being named an All-Star and finishing third in American League Cy Young voting.

From there, he simply could not replicate the same level of performance and wound up being demoted before missing the rest of the 2023 campaign with some issues that some suspected as more mental than physical.

Returning to the big leagues last year and posting some solid numbers before suffering the injury which ended his season, there is hope among the fanbase that Manoah can return to form and become an ace once again.

He is still young and there is no reason to believe incapable of returning to form.

By the sounds of it, he is attacking his rehab with the relentless of getting back into the rotation to help this team.

If Manoah does indeed return to the Blue Jays this season, both the team and the fans would be absolutely thrilled.