If Jake Bloss is going to make his Toronto Blue Jays debut this season, there may not be a more perfect time than this week.

Since acquiring the right-hander as part of July’s Yusei Kikuchi trade, the organization has remained hopeful they’d be able to have him face big-league hitters at some point before the end of the year. That way, he could put in some early reps with pitching coach Pete Walker and the rest of the pitching department ahead of the 2025 season.

Bloss has already earned his first taste of the majors in ’24, logging a trio of starts with the Houston Astros earlier in the year. Because of that, the Blue Jays have been cautious not to push him too aggressively, especially in his first full season of professional baseball. Even so, the big-league club’s remaining schedule could present an opportunity to have him enter the off-season with some momentum.

Starting Tuesday, Toronto begins a slate of nine games in nine days, including three in Texas versus the Rangers, three at Tropicana Field versus the Tampa Bay Rays and three at home against the Boston Red Sox before receiving an off-day on Sep. 26.

Therein lies a chance for the Blue Jays to shift to a six-man rotation for one turn, allowing them to continue providing an extra day of rest for their regular five starters, something they’ve prioritized over the last few weeks. Alternatively, they could have Ryan Yarbrough spearhead a bullpen day instead of using a spot starter, which they’ve done previously.

The thing with calling up Bloss, however, is it’ll become trickier to find an ideal landing spot after this week. He’s currently on track to pitch Friday or Saturday with triple-A Buffalo, whose schedule ends this Sunday. If he makes that start, it’ll likely eliminate him for next week’s series versus Boston, meaning his only chance to appear would be during the club’s final three games against the Miami Marlins. But that’d take away one final start from someone else.

Among those options, the most sensible plan likely involves having Bloss join the team in Tampa Bay for a start at Tropicana Field later this week. It’d be a far more favourable matchup than facing a lineup like Boston’s, for instance, allowing him to skip a series of tough left-handed batters — like Jarren Duran and Rafael Devers — that have proved troublesome for him this season.

At the same time, even if it ends up being the Marlins rather than the Rays or Red Sox, odds are we’ll see the 23-year-old righty make his Blue Jays debut before the 2024 campaign concludes. So, let’s try to anticipate what to expect when that time comes.

Bloss has endured quite a heavy workload in his first full year of pro ball. Between climbing three minor-league levels and reaching The Show, his combined innings total sits at 100.2 just one season after he completed only 18.2 frames as Houston’s third-round selection last summer.

Understandably, Toronto has gradually brought along its No. 3 top prospect per MLB Pipeline since he joined the organization. They hit the pause button shortly after he arrived and sent him to the player development complex in Dunedin to set some baseline recordings in the pitching lab, giving him time to catch his breath before assigning him to triple-A Buffalo.

Part of Bloss’ throwing progression has also seen him complete fewer than five innings in all seven of his starts since joining the Bisons, lasting 4.2 in his most recent start last Sunday — his longest outing since June 15 (6.1 innings). Several elevated pitch counts haven’t helped his cause of pitching deeper, either.

The deepest Bloss has pitched into a game as a professional hurler is 6.2 innings, which occurred in June during a double-A start. Considering he’s yet to come close to reaching that mark since then, tossing four innings or less in his three starts with the Astros, the Blue Jays will probably cap his debut around 4-5 innings — if it occurs this season, that is.

Lately, controlling the strike zone has been somewhat of a concern for Bloss, who, prior to Sunday’s bounce-back outing, issued 11 walks and one hit-by-pitch across 11.2 innings over his previous four starts.

Of those 11 free passes allowed, seven came via the 6-foot-3 righty’s four-seamer, which, as the chart below suggests, has been a tad wild in seven starts with Buffalo.

Bloss owns a first-pitch-strike rate of 51.2 per cent at triple-A since his Bisons debut, down slightly from the 60-per-cent clip — one per cent shy of the MLB average — he posted over his small sample size with the Astros. Considering he’s thrown his four-seamer over 50 per cent of the time in 0-0 counts, improving his fastball command certainly needs to be a focal point moving forward.

As does his ability to keep balls in the yard, as he’s surrendered four home runs with Buffalo — all against his four-seamer — and five in three starts with Houston this season.

In his brief time in the majors, Bloss posted respectable results against right-handed hitters, who hit .227/.261/.636 against him over 24 plate appearances. They also punched out almost 30 per cent of the time and registered a 31.1-per-cent whiff rate in that tiny sample size.

Lefties, however, were a completely different story.

They slashed .379/.419/.690, struck out less than 13 per cent of the time and recorded a measly 19-per-cent whiff rate across 30 plate appearances. And his triple-A results in those matchups with Buffalo have been fairly concerning, too.

Bloss has allowed a .392/.456/.667 opposing slash line in 57 plate appearances versus left-handers, who’ve created most of their damage against his four-seamer, resulting in an alarming .472 xwOBA and a 60-per-cent hard-hit rate against. They’ve also punched out only twice in 22 plate appearances against it thus far.

Without overpowering velocity, Bloss — whose six-pitch arsenal includes two fastballs, a four-seamer and a sinker, both averaging in the mid-90s — has repeatedly paid the price for missing over the heart of the plate with his heater. As a result, he’ll likely need to incorporate more of his secondary weapons (slider, curveball, changeup) to avoid being pummeled by lefties even further.