Back for Just One Game, Addison Barger Could Be Lost to Blue Jays Yet Again

Kim Klement Neitzel-Imagn Images

It’s beginning to look like a lost season for Addison Barger. The Toronto Blue Jays’ breakout slugger from 2025 has had a disastrous 2026 thus far. And from the latest report out of Rogers Centre, it sounds like it could be getting a lot worse.

Barger was off to a woeful start, with a .045 batting average (1-for-19) and .305 OPS in 28 plate appearances. He missed 25 games with injuries to both ankles, including a serious left ankle sprain. Then, after his long-awaited return on Saturday, he woke up Sunday with “right elbow soreness”. He’s now off to have an MRI.

Barger was penciled into Sunday’s lineup as the leadoff hitter. But just hours before the game, he was pulled due to the elbow issue. The imaging will hopefully provide some answers on Monday.

Barger threw out runner at the plate with 101.2 mph throw on Saturday

One would have to suspect that the laser beam throw he made—at over 101 mph—in Saturday’s game to nail Jorge Soler at the plate has something to do with Sunday’s ominous development.

“Barger’s arm needs to be studied in a lab”. That’s the caption used by writer Vivek Jacob to illustrate Barger’s missile of a throw. And he’ll be getting his wish when Barger slides into the MRI machine.

After a slow start to the ’25 campaign last year, Barger busted out beginning in late May, with five homers in seven games, and he never looked back. The power-packed slugger, who plays third base and right field, finished the year with 21 homers, 74 RBIs, and a .765 OPS.

Barger was a beast in Toronto’s thrilling playoff run all the way to the 11th inning of World Series Game 7. He batted .367 in the postseason with a 1.025 OPS. He had three homers and nine RBIs, highlighted by the Blue Jays’ first-ever World Series grand slam, in Game 1.

Given his latest elbow problem and Toronto’s troubling 18-22 start, it doesn’t appear that Barger will be adding many heroics like that to his resume anytime soon.