The Anthony Alford Era Begins!

What happens when an injury replacement gets injured? You reach even deeper into the bag of reinforcements than you’d ever expect. Darrell Ceciliani has been placed on the 10-day disabled list with a shoulder injury suffered while homering last night off of Julio Teheran, and coming up in his place will be top prospect Anthony Alford.

Nobody expected Alford to be up in a situation like this, but my god are the Blue Jays desperate. In terms of position players, they have Dalton Pompey, Josh Donaldson, Troy Tulowitzki, Russell Martin, Steve Pearce, and Ceciliani on the DL, and Kevin Pillar serving a suspension. The only options left on the 40-man to join the team are Alford, Harold Ramirez, Lourdes Gurriel, and Richard Urena, all prospects.

So up comes Alford! All the way from Double-A New Hampshire, where he’s been tearing the damn cover off of the ball. Alford, through 33 games and 141 plate appearances, has three homers and 11 RBIs and is slashing a .325/.411/.455 line.

I doubt he gets much game action, but based on the way 2017 has gone, anything can happen and it wouldn’t be that surprising. Yesterday, the Jays had Ceciliani in centre field, Zeke in left, and Jose Bautista in right. When Ceciliani left the game, Dwight Smith Jr. replaced him and Zeke slid to centre. Tonight? Who knows!

When Pillar finishes his suspension and is re-activated Saturday, Smith will go back down to Triple-A, because he isn’t on the 40-man and is only an emergency replacement for Pillar, and when Tulo is activated, which is hopefully soon, Alford will likely be sent back.