Blue Jays free agent target: Dustin May

Dustin May: 2026 World Series Champion. That isn’t some alternate Spider-Verse timeline; that’s something that actually happened.

The Toronto Blue Jays didn’t have any Milwaukee Brewers connections on the 26-man roster, but one former Blue Jays player was part of the Brewers’ coaching staff, and a former Blue Jays coach was also on the Brew Crew. Daniel Vogelbach and Guillermo Martinez were the lone links between the Jays and this year’s World Champions.

The Blue Jays have signed former World Series winners in the past, but May has been on a wild journey, starting as a Los Angeles Dodgers uber-prospect and becoming one of the most well-travelled MLB players over the last two seasons. Since the start of 2025, he’s played for four organizations, and now the 29-year-old is a free agent for the second time in his career.

While there are umpteen tantalizing free-agent starting pitcher options this winter, the Blue Jays would be doing themselves a disservice if they didn’t look for a value play on a starter, in order to splash the pot on a higher-priced free agent hitter like Seiya Suzuki, Teruaki Sato or Brandon Lowe.

Let’s dive into May’s numbers as a starting pitcher and whether he could be a back-end rotation piece for the Blue Jays in 2027 and beyond.

May started the season with the St. Louis Cardinals after signing a one-year, $12.5-million deal. He had a rough start to the season, posting a 5.28 ERA through his first six starts of the campaign. The Texas native straightened things out in May, sporting a 3.86 ERA in five starts.

May’s control in June was among the best of his career, with a 0.926 WHIP. His complete-game one-hit shutout on June 15 against the San Diego Padres was the best of May’s career as measured by Game Score.

With the Cardinals in sell mode, St. Louis traded May and JoJo Romero to the Brewers on August 3. Despite having the best team in the National League behind him, May was slightly worse with the Brew Crew than he had been with the Cardinals.

In 10 starts down the stretch, May had a 5.65 ERA in 36.2 innings. Walks were an issue, as inflated pitch counts limited May to only three quality starts in 10 efforts with Milwaukee. In the postseason, May wasn’t any better, making two starts, appearing in five games, and delivering a 5.73 ERA.

One interesting note is that May’s fastball velocity increased by a tick in 2026, from 94.3 MPH in 2025 to 95.6 MPH in 2026. It only netted him a few extra strikeout percentage points, but his four-seamer velocity is in the upper tier of MLB starting pitchers.

If the Blue Jays are looking for value on the starting pitching market, there might not be a better name out there than May. He had a lacklustre showing in the postseason for the Brewers, which had the exact opposite effect of Freddy Peralta, whose value skyrocketed with the Tampa Bay Rays.

As a bit of a pet project, May seems to have untapped potential in his repertoire, and he’s yet to turn 30 years old. Over the last two seasons combined, May has a 4.82 ERA and 4.22 FIP over 54 starts and 278 innings. Those are back-of-the-rotation numbers, but reliable back-of-the-rotation arms are a necessary part of any contending team.

May is also a pitcher who could be converted into a full-time reliever. With his high fastball velocity, he might be a natural fit in the Blue Jays bullpen, but with a lack of a wipeout secondary pitch, he’d need some refinement on his sweeper or sinker to reinvent himself as a reliever.

The market value for May looks like three years and $46.25 million according to Spotrac, two years and $30 million according to MLB Trade Rumors, and Kiley McDaniel of ESPN predicts May will land a modest one-year deal worth $14 million.

Despite May playing for the World Series champs, there doesn’t seem to be a consensus among outlets about what deal is out there for him. That it ranges from $14 million up to $46.25 million is a huge variance, but I’m willing to bet it’s much closer to the lower end than the higher end of those projections.

If someone like Spencer Miles stays in the bullpen, I like the Blue Jays to pluck someone like May for the back of their starting rotation as a No. 4 or 5 starter. Despite a few short-term injuries for May, he’s made most of his scheduled starts since returning from Tommy John surgery in 2024.