Santander will undergo left labral surgery on Wednesday with Dr. Keith Meister and is expected to miss five to six months, manager John Schneider announced, another brutal blow after injuries and poor performance wiped out the first year of his five-year, $92.5-million deal.
Santander dealt with this nagging left shoulder injury throughout 2025, which at one point involved a subluxation and eventually evolved into some nagging inflammation he couldn’t shake. Santander returned just in time for the postseason and lasted until midway through the ALCS, when he had to be removed from the roster with a back injury. Now, he’s staring back up that steep hill.
“He was resting and rehabbing in November and December, then he kind of had a setback when he started ramping up with his hitting earlier in January,” said Schneider. “He came over to the complex, got checked out and did everything we could to avoid this. At this point, after what we dealt with last year and in talking with Tony, this is the best possible way to get him back to 100 percent. This is unfortunate timing, obviously.”
The Blue Jays, by going through this a year ago, have a blueprint on how to handle it. For now, it sounds like they’ll stick to that plan instead of scrambling for an immediate replacement.
“We were at a position where acquisitions probably would have meant some level of subtraction,” general manager Ross Atkins said, “meaning we would have had to look to trade someone had we acquired another significant position player. We feel like we’re prepared to handle setbacks.”
Not only did Santander miss significant time last year, but so did Daulton Varsho and Andrés Giménez. The Blue Jays leaned into their depth and many of those players rose to the occasion, including Ernie Clement, Addison Barger and Nathan Lukes, among others. The Blue Jays are confident in their depth, which is still an impressive group, but with one eye on this roster’s floor, the other eye still needs to be looking at its ceiling.
Santander’s comeback — even a modest one — was such a key piece to maintaining this offense, particularly when you consider the potential for regression in some areas. The Blue Jays turned to their internal options in 2025 and it worked brilliantly, but the ’25 season was a best-case scenario in so many ways. That’s what a season looks like when it all comes together, but if the Blue Jays are challenged with further injuries beyond this to their position player group, it starts to get thin.
The door is wide open now and this will impact multiple positions on the diamond. Barger will spend the majority of his time in right field now, leaving third base to Kazuma Okamoto and a major opportunity for infielder Leo Jiménez, who is out of options. It also leaves more reps for Lukes, Myles Straw, Davis Schneider and any prospects who would like to kick down the door.
“Last year, we talked about Alan Roden being really exciting. This year, RJ Schreck is someone I’m really excited for, just to see him embrace that opportunity,” Atkins said. “And Joey Loperfido, who you already know very well.”
The realities of baseball are back, with Tuesday also bringing news from Schneider that Shane Bieber would be ramping up slower this season as he deals with right forearm fatigue, and Bowden Francis will miss the entire 2026 season after undergoing UCL reconstruction.
The Santander news hits the Blue Jays hardest on the eve of pitchers and catchers reporting for Spring Training, though, and this club will be left to look for upside elsewhere.
