Blue Jays' Max Scherzer has radical idea to empower starting pitchers
Article excerpt
Max Scherzer, the veteran pitcher now with the Blue Jays, is advocating for a significant shift in how baseball manages its starting pitchers. Rather than following modern trends of early bullpen usage and pitch counts, Scherzer wants to revive the "workhorse mentality" where starters throw deeper into games. The proposal challenges the current orthodoxy of load management and specialization that has dominated baseball for the past decade. Scherzer's pitch, informed by decades of experience as one of baseball's most durable starters, suggests giving pitchers more agency and confidence to stay in games longer.
Blue Jays' Max Scherzer has radical idea to empower starting pitchers originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
Max Scherzer is old school. Even when managers tried to pull him early from a game for whatever reason, he usually scared them away. When he was in his prime, it was normal for him to go triple digits in his pitch count. However, this trait is rare among today's starting pitchers.
In the era of workload management, where most starters are limited to five or at best six innings, Scherzer wants MLB to step in with a bold rule. The Toronto Blue Jays veteran wants MLB to adopt a minimum 100-pitch rule for all starters across both leagues.
"I would love to see some type of pitch minimum brought into the game so that way the starter has to go out there and throw, you know, a hundred pitches," Scherzer said in conversation with MLBFITS. "That's something that I hate seeing within the game. I get why it's going on, but I would love to see things to be, to try to empower the starting pitcher."
Scherzer stretched that seven innings or 105 pitches should be minimum requirement from a starting pitcher. He also don't like when starters get pulled out, when their pitch count is in the 90s.
"Try to get starting pitchers back to throwing, you know, trying to get to seven innings, 105 pitches, and have that kind of be a standard throughout the game. You know, if you're, you know, giving up let's say two, three runs and you're at 90 pitches, no, you got to continue to pitch. You got to keep going back out there," the veteran right-hander added.
Max Scherzer wants MLB to make starters throw a minimum of 100 pitches before they can get taken out of the game
(via @_mlbfits) pic.twitter.com/lg1kjlRfbh
, Jomboy Media (@JomboyMedia) June 15, 2026
The right-hander wants MLB to reconsider the role of starting pitchers. Being a three-time Cy Young winner, the Blue Jays veteran wants current aces to adopt a workhorse mentality and tally up a huge number of innings.
MORE: Blue Jays' Max Scherzer makes MLB history, but he may be done
Max Scherzer returns to enter 3,500 Ks ballclub
After completing his rehab assignments, Max Scherzer returned for the Blue Jays in their game against the Philadelphia Phillies. He didn't have a great start, though, giving up five earned runs over 3.1 innings, raising his season ERA to 10.23.
However, there was still an important moment that would let the right-hander fall back into this game in good regard.
The right-hander struck out Kyle Schwarber in the first inning to reach 3,500 career strikeouts. He becomes only the 11th MLB pitcher to do so and second only to Justin Verlander among active pitchers.
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