EmailPrintOpen Extended ReactionsThree-time Cy Young Award winner Max Scherzer has agreed to return to the Toronto Blue Jays, a source confirmed to ESPN's Alden Gonzalez on Wednesday.The deal is for one year and $3 million, according to multiple reports.Bringing Scherzer back became a bigger need for Toronto with right-hander Bowden Francis undergoing season-ending Tommy John surgery earlier this month and with Shane Bieber delayed with a bout of forearm fatigue.Scherzer, 41, will join newcomers Cody Ponce and Dylan Cease in the rotation. The Blue Jays could choose to ramp him up slowly, prompting him to join the rotation in-season.As Scherzer has pitched into his 40s, he has increasingly lost time to injury. He threw a total of 85 regular-season innings for the Blue Jays in 2025 after accumulating only 43 for the Texas Rangers in 2024.Blue Jays manager John Schneider raved about Scherzer's competitiveness and preparation, and he threw well enough to earn three big starts for Toronto in the postseason -- in Game 4 of the American League Championship Series, when he worked through early-inning trouble to stifle the Seattle lineup, and in Games 3 and 7 of the World Series.Five years after he throws his final pitch, Scherzer will make a speech in Cooperstown, and presumably his election into the Hall of Fame will be unanimous or close to it. Scherzer has finished in the top five of Cy Young Award voting eight times. He has a career 221-117 record with a 3.22 ERA, and his career Adjusted OPS+ of 131 is equivalent to that of Sandy Koufax.Scherzer was a first-round draft pick of the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2006, and he debuted in the big leagues two years later. His delivery at that time drew a lot of scrutiny because of how he snapped his head to the left as he released the ball.Arizona officials discussed the possibility of turning him into a closer, but the Diamondbacks instead shipped him to the Detroit Tigers as part of a three-team trade with the New York Yankees. With the Tigers, Scherzer flourished, going 82-35 over five seasons while establishing himself as one of the game's premier pitchers.He signed with the Washington Nationals after the 2014 season, and he and Stephen Strasburg helped them to a championship in 2019. Over the course of his career, he has grossed nearly $370 million in salary, a reflection of his excellence on the mound.MLB Network was first to report Scherzer's agreement with Toronto.ESPN's Buster Olney contributed to this report.
