With a dull vibe being emitted from a 7-13 start to the 2026 season for the Blue Jays, there is a bit of a bright spot coming from Myles Straw, who fittingly has “Mr. Brightside” by The Killers as his walk-up music.

Before you read too much into the headline, of course, it would be a great time for Straw to start being a catalyst at the plate, given the Blue Jays are averaging only 3.55 runs per game and are 25th in total runs scored. It would be a great time for any of Toronto’s hitters to start producing runs, but Straw’s case is a little different.

Straw was acquired by the Blue Jays in January of 2025 along with international bonus pool money and cash from the Cleveland Guardians. Without the Blue Jays admitting it directly, this trade was primarily viewed as acquiring international pool flexibility to help acquire Roki Sasaki and secondarily viewed as grabbing Straw to fill roster needs while Cleveland shedded his contract. While missing out on Sasaki was a rough swing-and-a-miss, the Blue Jays had to take on Straw’s largely backloaded contract, as well as utilize their international funds elsewhere.

Playing an almost-even amount of games as a starter and substitute last season, Straw slashed a respectable .262/.313/.367 with 4 homers, 32 RBIs, and 14 doubles. His batting average was 17 points higher against left-handed pitchers, a matchup in which the Jays would seemingly always place Straw.

This season, Straw has already seen action in 15 of Toronto’s 20 games. He’s hit .391 with a .982 OPS in 25 plate appearances, including a double, a homer, and 3 RBIs. Two of those RBIs came during an extra-innings win over the Brewers on Tuesday night when he doubled in a pair of runs to extend the Blue Jays’ lead in the 10th inning.

Some of Straw’s underlying metrics are encouraging as well; he’s currently sporting the highest hard-hit rate of his career at 31.8%, and he’s also hitting .538 against the fastball without whiffing once. Furthermore, Straw is pulling the ball in the air at a 45.5% clip amongst all of his batted balls, and while that doesn’t completely correlate to success at the plate, it’s a drastic change from the rest of his career.

Given the amount of offensive renaissance that we witnessed from last year’s team, who is to say that Straw can’t be next?

The caveat to all of these numbers is that the sample size is limited, and perhaps this is simply just a nice stretch of outings for Straw. But, it would certainly be the best time for Straw to unlock some of the best baseball of his career, given where this team is at. A couple of big hits here and there, as he had during their aforementioned win over the Brewers, could be the difference in winning a game or not, and wins are coming at a premium right now for the Blue Jays.

At the time of writing this, Daulton Varsho is still being considered day-to-day, meaning Straw has an open path to playing time in centre field. No one feels sorry for the Blue Jays that their IL is lengthy, and it’s up to the guys in that locker room to rewrite the script on this campaign. Straw can be one of those players to make it happen (if he isn’t already), and the narrative would be nice considering how his arrival in Toronto was viewed.

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