The Blue Jays took care of business, beating the Yankees to punch their ticket to the post-season.

It’s pretty remarkable that this is where we are, really. After losing nearly 100 games last season, after the season getting postponed due to COVID-19 in March, after not having a place to play just moments before the start of a season that looked like it could fall apart at any moment — the Buffalo Blue Jays of Toronto are a playoff team.

Say what you want about the 60-game slate and the expanded 16-team field, this team has done an incredible job. They’ve navigated through plenty of adversity and injuries to get to where they are and that should absolutely be celebrated.

But, do you know what’s even better than being a playoff team? Winning a playoff series.

As of right now, it looks like the Jays will be heading down to the House of Horrors to play the Tampa Bay Rays in the wild-card round. Tampa has the best record in the American League by two games so they’ve basically got that spot locked up. The Jays sit eighth, two games behind the Yankees, so it’s unlikely they’ll be able to catch them at this point.

Between now and that wild-card series against the Rays, we have a tune-up series in Buffalo with the Orioles. Charlie Montoyo will have to balance giving some of his players some much-needed rest while also keeping everyone sharp and ensuring the team’s momentum doesn’t fade away before heading to Tampa.

Hyun Jin Ryu is scheduled to pitch Game 1 of the wild-card round on Tuesday on regular rest and Taijuan Walker, who’s slated to start the series opener in Baltimore, will also be on normal rest for Game 2. That much is fairly obvious, but the possible Game 3 is a bit more of a mystery.

Matt Shoemaker made his return to the team on Monday after missing a month of action due to a shoulder injury. He pitched well over three innings of work and will have one more opportunity to build himself up against Baltimore, but it’s probably unreasonable to assume Shoemaker can go deep into a game.

The other option here is starting Robbie Ray, which makes some sense given Tampa Bay’s lefty-heavy lineup. Again, though, Ray hasn’t been reliable at getting deep into starts, so maybe piggybacking these two would be the right play.

And then there’s the bullpen, which is a bit of an enigma at this point.

Ken Giles, of course, is having Tommy John and won’t be back this year. Jordan Romano is throwing a bullpen session and could be back this weekend. Julian Merryweather is dealing with an elbow issue and there’s no guarantee he’ll be back. Nate Pearson was just activated from the Injured List and will need to pitch in Baltimore to see if he’s a legitimate option for the playoffs.

When it comes to position players, I doubt we’ll see much of a change from what the team is currently rolling with.

The one thing we could see is a third catcher added to the post-season roster, making it easier to use Alejandro Kirk as the designated hitter. Caleb Joseph isn’t on the 40-man roster but Reese McGuire is, so it would be easier to add the latter. I’m not sure having a third catcher is that necessary, but it’s a luxury you can afford with a 28-man roster.

Anyways, assuming the Jays don’t have a third catcher on their 28-man post-season roster, we can guess that they’ll have Danny Jansen, Alejandro Kirk, Vlad Jr., Cavan Biggio, Bo Bichette, Joe Panik, Santiago Espinal, Travis Shaw, Jonathan Villar, Teoscar Hernandez, Randal Grichuk, Lourdes Gurriel, and Jonathan Davis as their 13 position players, leaving 15 spots for pitchers. Rowdy Tellez is a part of the playoff pool, but it seems he won’t be ready for the wild-card series, so I didn’t include him on the 28-man.

Hyun Jin Ryu, Taijuan Walker, Matt Shoemaker, and Robbie Ray are the four guys who will be used as starters, so there are 11 other spots for guys to pitch out of the ‘pen. Anthony Bass, Rafael Dolis, and A.J. Cole will obviously be there, so that leaves eight more spots.

If Shun Yamaguchi and Ross Stripling are there with the ability to provide length if needed, there probably isn’t need on the post-season roster for either of Tanner Roark or Chase Anderson, who have struggled mightily as of late.

I would expect Anthony Kay, Thomas Hatch, and Ryan Borucki to be there, while Nate Pearson, Julian Merryweather, and Jordan Romano may or may not depending on health. If those three righties can’t go, the next in line would be Patrick Murphy, Sean Reid-Foley, and T.J. Zeuch. But, as I said above, adding a third catcher might be more worthwhile than one of these pitchers.