Ever since day three of the 2025 season, the Toronto Blue Jays’ starting rotation has been playing catch-up. Whether it was Max Scherzer’s injury or Bowden Francis turning back into a pumpkin, the Blue Jays’ starting five has been behind the eight ball since opening weekend.

While the rotation has since stabilized, it’s still one of the weakest facets of their game. Their 4.60 starter ERA ranks 25th in baseball, and their 32% quality start rate ranks 18th in baseball. If there’s one area where the Blue Jays could drastically raise their floor, it’s their starting pitching.

Getting a starter (or two) is no doubt top of GM Ross Atkins’ shopping list. But with so much parity in the league as of late, it’s hard to say which teams will be sellers and which will be buyers. With so many teams in the periphery, clubs like the Guardians or Diamondbacks may choose to let it ride instead of selling off their rentals.

If some of these teams rich with starting pitching options decide to sell, these would be the best rental starting pitching trade targets for the Blue Jays at the deadline.

The Blue Jays haven’t had any Canucks on the roster since Jordan Romano and Zach Pop from last year, so why not bring Cal Quantrill back home? Some of his peripherals don’t look great, like his 5.65 ERA in 18 starts. He also led the National League in walks last season, but he’s trimmed his walk rate from 10.5% with the Rockies last year to 6.8% with the Marlins this year.

It is interesting how his strikeout rate is back up to 19% this year, the highest it’s been since 2021. Quantrill may not have the sexiest arsenal on this list, but if the Blue Jays are simply looking to raise the floor of their starting rotation depth, he might be a decent get at what’s expected not to be an exorbitant cost from the Marlins.

The moment Andrew Heaney signed his one-year $5.25 million contract with the Pittsburgh Pirates, it felt like he was signing to audition for the next team he’d be playing for in the second half of the season. Heaney had a strong showing for the Texas Rangers down the stretch last year, and he had a 10-strikeout game in his second start of 2025.

The one thing you’re guaranteed to get with Heaney games is strikeouts, but that also runs his pitch count pretty high, which makes him the quintessential “five and dive” guy. The issue for the Blue Jays is that they already have two of those pitchers in Scherzer and Eric Lauer, so does it make sense to trade for a third?

At least Heaney comes in as a lefty, which gives a slightly different look to the rotation. It never hurts to add to the pitching depth, especially considering the tightrope the Blue Jays are navigating with Scherzer’s thumb issue. It would be wise to have another arm in their back pocket just in case.

If you’re wondering if we’re ever going to get out the “sub-5 ERA dudes” on this list, I promise we’ll get there eventually. Chris Paddack of the Minnesota Twins is having a Paddack-esque season with a 4.95 ERA in 19 starts for the Twinkies, to go along with his career ERA of 4.45.

His expected ERA of 4.54 suggests the right-hander should be having a slightly better campaign, but his XFIP of 4.72 paints Paddack back into that mediocre starter territory. Credit to Paddack, he rarely walks batters, and he gets a lot of hitters to chase outside the strike zone, so those free passes are few and far between during his games.

His strikeout rate is down 5.6% year over year, but he also does a decent job of keeping the ball in the yard with a HR/FB rate of 9.5% in 2025, the lowest of his career. The Blue Jays’ starting rotation gives up enough home runs as-is, so they wouldn’t need to worry too much if they bring Paddack into the fold in a trade.

It’s not a guarantee the Twins would be sellers, either, but they may even decide to trade away a rental like Paddack and yet somehow make their team better via addition by subtraction if they could get a big league piece back, like a Joey Loperfido or a Davis Schneider?

A late addition to this list, I admittedly forgot about Michael Soroka as a rental option, unfortunately, with him toiling away with the rebuilding Washington Nationals. The Nats uncharacteristically went out and spent $6 million to add the Calgary native as a rotation piece for 2025, yet he has arguably surpassed expectations for a flyer contract.

With a 26% strikeout rate, Soroka is having the best year of his career in terms of punch outs, despite that ugly-looking 5.35 ERA on his resume. His xERA of 3.21 suggests Soroka has been a little unlucky this season. With his ERA over two full runs higher than his expected ERA, he ranks 10th in MLB in the difference between his ERA and xERA.

Soroka ran into a rough patch as of late, but the potential for big strikeout numbers is tantalizing for a contender like Toronto looking to upgrade its rotation. If the Blue Jays could squeeze a few more innings out of Soroka, he would be a nice fit for this team.

After a huge breakout campaign in 2022 and finishing fifth in NL Cy Young voting, Zac Gallen is having the worst season of his career in 2025. His strikeouts are down, his walks are home, his home runs are up, which is a trio of disasters for a starting pitcher.

According to Bob Nightengale of USA Today, the Blue Jays have shown interest in Gallen as the Diamondbacks prepare to sell off some of their top-end rental players.

Gallen’s ERA is nearly two runs higher year-over-year, and yet there is still some intrigue about whether this may just be a one-off for the 29-year-old. If Pete Walker and the Blue Jays coaching staff feel like they can unlock some magic with Gallen again, he might be worth taking a chance on.

He had a really rough start to the season with some big blowup games with five, six and seven earned run outings, but Gallen has since calmed down and has two quality starts in his last three games. Among the pool of rental starting pitchers, Gallen has the most upside.

After some of the other starting pitchers on this list, it’s a bit of a shock to the system to see a 3.34 starting pitcher, but yes, Merrill Kelly is the most ideal rental starting pitcher on the market this trade deadline. Even at 36 years old, Kelly has the regular season track record and most recently, the playoff pedigree any team would feel comfortable entrusting to pitch big games in October.

Similar to Chris Bassitt, Kelly doesn’t boast big velocity, but he uses an extensive pitch mix to keep hitters off-balance. He’s delivering a quality start for the Diamondbacks more than half of the time, and he’s averaging 5.8 innings per start this season. And there aren’t any red flags that might scare off prospective buyers.

The caveat is the asking price, and since Kelly is in a tier all to himself among the rental starting pitchers, the D-Backs will ask a ton. Think of a similar package to what the Blue Jays received in exchange for Yusei Kikuchi last year: Joey Loperfido, Will Wagner and Jake Bloss.

If the Blue Jays were to acquire a pitcher of Kelly’s ilk, he’d immediately vault to the front of the starting rotation as the number one arm among their starting five. That might be more of an indictment against the rest of the rotation, but it also says a lot about the quality Kelly brings.

He has the potential to be a big difference-maker for a contender like the Blue Jays, which could mean the difference between winning a playoff series and going home early.

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