How Concerned Are You About George Springer?

No player was more important to the Blue Jays' success in 2025 than George Springer.

It's not just that he led the team in home runs, runs scored, on-base percentage, wRC+, and every type of Wins Above Replacement. It's not just that he stayed red-hot in October, battling through injuries to hit another four home runs, including the go-ahead shot in Game 7 of the ALCS. It's that he, like the Blue Jays themselves, achieved so much more than anyone anticipated heading into the year. 

Springer wasn't Toronto's only star in 2025. He had help from Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Kevin Gausman, Alejandro Kirk, and Bo Bichette, all of whom had excellent seasons of their own. The difference is that the Blue Jays were counting on Guerrero, Gausman, Kirk, and Bichette to lead the way. Springer was 35 and coming off the worst season of his career. He was only supposed to be a role player.

FanGraphs' preseason projections saw Toronto as an 82-83 win team. They saw Springer as a 1.5-2.0 win player. No single factor elevated the Blue Jays more than Springer turning back the clock and earning MVP votes for the first time since his peak in Houston.

The Blue Jays sure could use that version of Springer now. 

Through 29 games and 125 trips to the plate, the four-time All-Star is slashing .197/.274/.321 with three home runs and nine RBI. His wRC+ is 30% worse than league average, while his expected wOBA puts him among the bottom 20% of hitters in the sport. Last year, it felt like every fly ball he hit had a chance to leave the yard. These days, he's having trouble getting fly balls out of the infield.

I don't know how concerned I should be. 

I never expected Springer to repeat his 2025 season. That would have been too much to hope for. However, my theory over the winter was that any regression from Springer would be counterbalanced by a return to form for Anthony Santander. Springer was worth 5.2 fWAR last year. Santander was worth -0.9. I hoped each of them could be worth, say, 2.5 wins in 2026. 

Needless to say, we aren't getting 2.5 WAR from Santander this season. But can Springer still be an above-average contributor?

Evidently, John Schneider thinks so. Aside from the 15 games he missed with a fractured toe, Springer has played almost every day. He's hit leadoff in all 28 games he's started. 

Of course, it's not like Toronto has another perfect option for the leadoff spot right now. Even so, it would be hard for Schneider to justify keeping Springer at the top of the order unless he thought a bounce-back was imminent. Springer has a .232 on-base percentage in May. His 37 wRC+ in the month is the third-worst mark on the team, ahead of only a slumping Guerrero and an at-risk-of-losing-his-job-soon Tyler Heineman. 

None of that is good. At the same time, the fact that Vladdy came up in that last sentence is precisely why I'm not smashing the panic button. Maybe my concerns about Springer are overblown. 

Springer's 70 wRC+ is bad. But guess what? Fernando Tatis Jr. has a 71 wRC+ right now. Cal Raleigh has a 63 wRC+. Bo Bichette has a 74 wRC+. Samples are still small around the league, and Springer's especially so, given the time he spent on the IL.

Need more proof that 29 games is a small sample? Just last year, when Springer was one of the best hitters in baseball, he had a 29-game stretch where he was barely better than he's been this year. From May 15 to June 18, he hit .188 with an 85 wRC+. 

In 2024, he had a 30 wRC+ in his worst 29-game period. The year before, it was a 59 wRC+ in his lowest 29-game sample. In 2022, he had two completely separate 29-game stretches with a 90 wRC+, and in 2021, his first year with the Jays, he posted a 56 wRC+ in a 29-game span from August to September. Even in 2017 and '18, his first two All-Star seasons with the Astros, he had equally poor stretches of similar lengths. Ups and downs are just a part of baseball. 

Underlying numbers aren't immune to the small sample size effect either. Springer's .286 xwOBA is poor. His .306 xwOBA on contact is more troubling. Yet, he's had stretches with numbers like that before. He's always managed to rebound. 

That's a reassuring thought. That is, until I start to worry that it's too reassuring. What if I'm using the small sample size defense to shield myself from the truth? Springer's quality-of-contact metrics look a lot like they did in 2024. His bat speed is higher than it was that year, but he's swinging under the ball so often that he isn't putting that bat speed to use.

I feel like I'm in a sci-fi movie, staring at so many different George Springers, and I don't know which is real. There's the superstar from 2025. There's the disappointment so far in 2026. There's also the player Springer was in 2024, which seemed like a disappointment at the time, but who the Jays would take in a heartbeat now. Finally, there's the Springer I thought we'd get this year. The 2.5-win player. The happy medium between superstar and scrub.

They say that when you hear hoofbeats, you should think horses, not zebras. It's good advice. My problem, however, is that I don't know which option here represents the horses and which ones represent various other hoofed creatures. Am I ignoring the facts in front of me if I still believe in Springer? Am I ignoring his track record if I don't? Am I just avoiding the hard decisions if I split the difference? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

All I know is that it's May 20 (as I'm writing this), and George Springer is hitting .196 with a .596 OPS. How concerned are you about that? 

Stats and rankings updated prior to games on Wednesday, May 20.