Blue Jays' injury picture starting to come into focus

Following Tuesday’s 6-0 loss to the Cleveland Indians, the Toronto Blue Jays looked in dire straits from an injury perspective.

One day later, they aren’t a model of robust health, but the light at the end of the tunnel is looking a little closer with a couple of revelations. The first is that Kendrys Morales, who left Tuesday’s game with hamstring tightness, isn’t headed to the 10-day disabled list. Instead the big designated hitter is day-to-day.

“We saw the MRI, I think it’s minor,” said manager John Gibbons. “We’re going to give him a day or two see if we can get him through it without putting him on [the disabled list]. We’ll have a better idea tomorrow.”

That’s far from definitively good news — and Morales could ultimately still hit the DL — but the injury doesn’t seem serious. After losing Russell Martin, Josh Donaldson, and Troy Tulowitzki, the Blue Jays can ill afford to go without another foundational component of their offence for an extended period of time. It appears they may dodge that bullet with Morales.

Prior to Wednesday’s game Gibbons also unveiled a tentative timeline for Tulowitzki’s return.

“The plan is for him to go down to Florida on Saturday,” he explained. “Then Sunday they don’t have anything going on. Then he’d play Monday and Tuesday and meet us in Atlanta [Wednesday]. That’s the plan as of today.”

The third Blue Jay to receive an injury update was Aaron Sanchez, who had returned to Toronto after testing his nail issue in an extended spring training game in Florida.

“When I got out there I felt good,” he said. “I threw everything, I threw everything for strikes. The first time out there my mechanics were a little rusty, I hadn’t been out there in a while, but the next three up and downs were really good. I was pleased.”

Although it’s too early to say with complete confidence, the smart money is on the right-hander starting for the Blue Jays Sunday.

“The finger felt fine, no problems,” he said. “Hopefully they’ll decide Friday and our plan is for Sunday. So hopefully everything goes according to plan and I’m right back out there.”

Setbacks do happen, but it appears the Blue Jays will have Morales, Tulowitzki and Sanchez back soon. It wouldn’t be surprising at this point to see all three back in uniform on the back end of the Blue Jays’ home-and-home series with the Atlanta Braves next week.

The situations for Donaldson, Martin and J.A. Happ are a little more opaque, but the Blue Jays will take what they can get at the moment. It looks like reinforcements could be on the way, which is good news for Gibbons who will work with a two-man bench of Chris Coghlan and Mike Ohlman on Wednesday.

“One of them’s a catcher [too],” he joked before the game. “And hopefully one of those [two] don’t have have to pitch.”