The Toronto Blue Jays played against the Arizona Diamondbacks last night, with the first pitch scheduled for 7:07 PM. Before Eric Lauer toed the rubber, all eyes were down in Syracuse at Polar Park, where Max Scherzer and the Buffalo Bisons were slated to play against the Worcester Red Sox, with their first pitch coming at 6:46 PM.

This was Scherzer’s second outing with the Bisons since he went on the IL in late March, after leaving his first start of the season with a thumb issue.

Scherzer started the appearance by striking out Nick Sogard via the swinging punchout, but walked Wilyer Abreu on seven pitches. A groundout back to Scherzer got the second out at first base, with Abreu advancing to second, but the right-hander was able to escape the jam by striking out Vaughn Grissom on three pitches, getting some help from the home plate umpire on a third-pitch strike call that was a bit outside.

His second inning was much more impressive, as he retired the side in order all via the strikeout, getting two Red Sox batters to swing and miss while a caught foul tip sat down Blake Sabol. Scherzer’s third inning saw the first hit of the day for Worcester, an outside changeup taken the opposite way for a slap single. The veteran arm would get a flyball for his first out of the inning, but balked with Sogard up again, moving the runner to second base with just the one tally. A groundout moved the runner to third but added another out to the board, and Scherzer dealt with the threat at the plate, getting Abreu to strike out on a low changeup in a seven-pitch battle that included four foul balls.

Scherzer lost a bit of his command in the fourth inning, hitting Grissom and walking another Red Sox batter, but he added another strikeout to his total for the day and kept the runs from scoring. The bottom of the fifth inning saw the Blue Jays’ pitcher collect his final strikeout of the day, getting Tyler McDonough to chase a cutter low in the zone. Scherzer wouldn’t notch the win, but the Bisons came out ahead by a score of 14-1.

The veteran arm was on a hard pitch count, with Scherzer being lifted after 75 pitches. He posted a 64% strike rate and generated a 15.7% whiff rate on the day while striking out eight batters compared to two walks. He mixed all five of his pitches well, leading with his four-seam fastball at a 42.2% rate, and was sitting in the low 90s with the fastball offering. Scherzer faced a mix of minor league arms as well as some guys with MLB experience, such as Grissom, Abreu, and Sabol. A few at-bats dragged on to elevate his pitch count a bit early, but it was still a successful outing for the right-hander.

The next step for Scherzer is to head back to Toronto, where the staff will assess his recovery from the outing and determine whether the thumb presents any issues. The current plan is that Scherzer will throw a side session in Toronto this weekend, and if all goes accordingly, he may get the start in Cleveland on Tuesday. His regular turn in the rotation would have been for Monday, and the Jays are off that day, so he would get another day of rest under his belt should he be good to go for the start against the Guardians next week.

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