TORONTO - Vladimir Guerrero Jr. keeps coming close at Rogers Centre, and the wait for his first home homer drags on.
On Tuesday night, Guerrero turned on a sinker and sent a 103.4 mph shot to deep centre. It carried 395 feet - just five feet shy of leaving the yard. It was the kind of drive he has launched out of plenty of parks before, but at home it still hasn’t happened.
“I believe in God, and when he decides the home run will come, it’ll come,” Guerrero told The Athletic after the game. “I know it’s going to come.
I just keep praying and keep working hard. Eventually, it’s going to come.”
He could only laugh at the latest near-miss after the Blue Jays’ 5-3 win over the Boston Red Sox. In the last month alone, he’s driven balls to the warning track and hit one off the top of the wall in centre. Too many times, he’s sprinted to first and watched the ball settle into a glove.
“I just laugh,” Guerrero said. “I just laugh and try not to think about it.”
The drought has become its own strange story. Guerrero has now gone 121 games and 61 home contests this season without a homer at home, even as the Rogers Centre crowd keeps chanting his name and rising for his at-bats.
Last October, he had eight towering drives leave the park. Even last year, when he finished with 23 regular-season homers, he never went more than 18 home games without one.
This has stretched well beyond normal.
There are reasons his swing has been off. Hitting coach David Popkins compared Guerrero’s complicated load and release to an orchestra, with some instruments out of tune. Guerrero’s back was barking before the All-Star break, and a recent MRI showed his hamstring is a bit inflamed.
Those issues may explain some of the power shortage, but they don’t erase it. In August, everyone is dealing with something. Not everyone, especially not someone with a $500 million contract, is homerless at home.
“I feel good,” Guerrero said. “But, like I say, sometimes you feel good and you still make outs.”
The Blue Jays are still leaning on the same belief: that Guerrero is one swing away, and that the home runs will start to show up. At this point, that faith is part of the job. The club has spent months trying to get him right, and giving up was never really an option with so much money and so much meaning attached to his bat.
There was a time this season when the focus looked more like an offseason fix, something to sort out for next year. Toronto doesn’t need Guerrero to launch 40 homers, but it does need him driving the ball with authority.
A strong finish would have helped both the front office and Guerrero feel better about what comes next. Instead, the Jays are trying to push through the present, and they could use a few more balls like Tuesday’s.
Toronto has won nine of its last 13 and turned a season that had them 10 games under .500 into one where they are now five games back. They’ve cut the gap from six teams between them and the final wild-card spot to five, and they’ve trimmed a 5 1/2-game deficit to 2 1/2.
“We have this right in front of us,” Guerrero said. “It’s one game at a time. Whatever happens, happens.”
The next six weeks still present a steep climb if the Blue Jays are going to get back into the October picture. They’re dealing with a rotation that just lost Trey Yesavage to meniscus surgery, with Yesavage week to week, Jameson Taillon out at least a couple weeks with forearm tendinitis, and Spencer Arrighetti sidelined by a rare foot condition with no clear return date.
They also need a bullpen that has been forced into heavy use to hold up, and their rookie spark plugs to keep beating league adjustments. And through all of that, they still need Guerrero.
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