Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Lives for October. The Blue Jays Need Him in May.

Guerrero proved himself as a big-game performer last postseason. But the Blue Jays are currently out of a playoff spot, in part due to his day-to-day struggles.

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. has yet to find his power stroke this year. | Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images

NEW YORK — For many baseball players, the key to success in October is to treat it like May. Don’t make this moment bigger than it is, they tell themselves. It’s the same game. 

But Vladimir Guerrero Jr. loves the big moment. He just produced one of the most dominant postseasons of all time—.397 batting average, .494 on-base percentage, .795 slugging percentage as the Blue Jays fell two runs short of a title—by remembering that playoff baseball is not, in fact, the same game. 

So now that he is off to the worst start of his career, should he try to find a way to treat May like October?

He can’t, he says. “When it’s May, it's May,” he says through interpreter Hector Lebron. “When it’s October, it's October.” 

Guerrero, 27, adds, “I do my best every at-bat.”

His best is better when the lights are brightest, though. This spring, he hit .444 playing for Team Dominican Republic in the World Baseball Classic, with two home runs and three doubles in 18 at-bats. His 1.421 OPS was fourth in the tournament among players with at least 10 plate appearances. And he scorches the ball at Yankee Stadium, playing against a team he has said he “[likes] to kill” and would never sign with—”not even dead.”

The Blue Jays love this about him. “Some guys just get up for those moments,” hitting coach David Popkins says admiringly. “There’s just another layer of focus. Other guys crumble in those moments.”

Guerrero has a .752 OPS entering Tuesday, 76th among qualified hitters. | Matt Blewett-Imagn Images

Still, though, the league does insist on staging a regular season. Toronto manager John Schneider has encouraged his star first baseman to try to “bottle up the mindset that was three, four weeks of the postseason, and how do you replicate that throughout 162,” the skipper says. He adds, “But it’s a fine line of putting too much pressure on yourself. Players are wired differently. Vlad plays well [in New York], he likes playing here, that’s well-documented, but you’ve gotta bring that, somehow, every single day. He does a good job of that. He understands who he is on this team and what people look at. You don’t want him to tense up, but you want him to have that mindset of, I’m just very present in the moment right now.”

Schneider says he tries to remind Guerrero, “You don’t have to hit the home run every time. You don’t have to drive in every run.”

But sometimes it feels as if he does. A year ago, Toronto signed him to a 14-year, $500 million contract extension because of how important he is to the lineup, and he knows it. Since he debuted in 2019, the Blue Jays are 112–62 (.643, a 104-win pace) when Guerrero homers and 114–34 (.770, a 125-win pace) when he drives in at least two runs. When he doesn’t homer, they’re 290–342 (.459, a 74-win pace) and when he doesn’t drive in a run, 418–430 (.493, an 80-win pace).

That’s as true as ever right now. Toronto has begun its pennant defense with a 21–26 start, putting it in third place in the American League East and out of a wild-card spot, and it ranks 23rd in baseball in runs scored and 20th in homers. Meanwhile, Guerrero is searching for his swing. His .285 average is only three points below his career number of .288, and he is striking out less often than he walks, with his 11.1% K-rate being the 10th best in the sport. But he has as many stolen bases as home runs, three, and the dinger he hit Sunday was his first since April 20. 

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. moved up in the order to the 2 spot and hit a home run in his first at bat 😮‍💨 pic.twitter.com/Z3Nwx2OShX

— MLB (@MLB) May 17, 2026

To be fair, pitchers are not making it easy on him, feeding him breaking balls and staying outside the zone. But Popkins says the issue is more about approach and mechanics than it is game-planning. “When he’s at his best,” he says, “it doesn’t really matter what they throw.”

He also believes that Guerrero is about to turn a corner, helped perhaps by the Blue Jays’ current four-game series at Yankee Stadium. Most hitters might not relish a date with the Yankees’ AL-best pitching staff and its 3.35 ERA. But maybe for Guerrero, that’s as close to October as you can get in May.

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