The first baseman has yet to hit a home run at home this season, and ESPN MLB Insider Buster Olney addressed his regression on a recent podcast.
The Toronto Blue Jays enter play on Friday night at 65-70 and 3.5 games back of the Cleveland Guardians in the battle for the third and final American League wild card spot.
The Seattle Mariners are right behind the Blue Jays at 4.0 games back, and the Mariners are also only 3.0 games back in the American League West, so this series has massive importance to both teams. The Mariners currently hold a 2-1 lead over the Blue Jays in the season series, so if tiebreakers come into play here, this series holds even more weight.
The Blue Jays are positioned well in this series, even though they are coming off a series loss against the Kansas City Royals. American League Cy Young contender Dylan Cease will pitch on Friday night while recent trade acquisition Jose Soriano will pitch on Saturday.
However, no matter how good the Jays pitching is, they are going to need offensive contributions from the likes of George Springer and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Springer hit his 13th home run of the season in Thursday's 13-2 loss, but Guerrero has yet to hit a home run at Rogers Centre this season.
He has just seven home runs on the year.
Speaking on our sister MarinersRoundtable podcast, ESPN MLB Insider Buster Olney was asked which regression is more shocking: Guerrero's or Cal Raleigh. Raleigh, who finished second in the American League MVP voting last season after hitting 60 home runs, is hitting just .167 with 18 home runs. He also missed a month of the season with an oblique injury.
Toronto Blue Jays first baseman Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (27) walks in the third inning against the Kansas City Royals at Rogers Centre. John E. Sokolowski-Imagn Images"Oh, no question it would be Vlady Jr.
I gotta say, and I worked all spring on a long piece on his preeminence as a hitter and how he was regarded within the game coming off that postseason, when he hit like, 400, like crazy. You know, like, eight home runs in 17 games or 18 games? Some unbelievable set of numbers that he had.
And so the idea that he would go into the fourth week of August without having hit a home run at home is nuts.
And that's the first thing that's cited by other teams when I talk to them about the biggest surprises this year. I would rank them: 1, Vladi Jr. 2, Cal Raleigh. 3, The New York Mets.
Like, it just makes you shake your head that Cal's in this position, but look, I don't think anybody thinks that Cal Raleigh is the pure hitter that Vlady Jr. is. He's never been a big power hitter, but he's always been a really good hitter, and that's kind of gone away this year, and it really is shocking."
Still just 27 years old, Guerrero is a six-time All-Star and a two-time Silver Slugger. He's had 23 home runs or more in each of the last five seasons, and he led the majors with 48 home runs in 121.
This year, he'll be lucky to get double-figures at this point. His lowest home run total ever is nine, which came in the COVID 2020 season. That was only 60 games.
The Blue Jays and Mariners will begin their series on Friday night at 7:15 p.m. ET. The game will air on Apple TV.
