PHILADELPHIA — The Toronto Blue Jays lost 7-6 in extras Sunday, capping a slogging weekend of nearly 11 game hours and 32 innings across three games. Toronto’s series win against the Philadelphia Phillies came at the end of a three-city trip with four extra-innings games and plenty of new faces arriving after the trade deadline.

“If me and the staff are tired,” manager John Schneider said, “imagine how the players are feeling. They’re gassed. They’re leaving it all out there.”

From centre field solutions to Jameson Taillon’s adjustments and a new bullpen mix, here are three takeaways from Toronto’s post-deadline trip:

Is the Blue Jays centre-field solution already here?

The Jays might still poke around centre-field options this winter, looking to replace Daulton Varsho for 2027 and beyond, but there are some contenders already in place.

Just days after Brett Bateman came over from the Chicago Cubs for Kevin Gausman, the 24-year-old was promoted to the big leagues.

He ambushed the first pitch he saw from Zack Wheeler and ripped a double to the left-field wall. In three games this weekend, Bateman notched three hits, walked twice and drove in a run in the series finale. There are still obvious areas for improvement against left-handed pitching and perhaps bunting, but Bateman flashed plus outfield defence, solid contact and impressed the Jays staff.

“The contact, the speed, the discipline, the defence, all that kind of stuff, I think is a pretty different profile than we’ve had here in a while,” Schneider said.

Bateman’s defence and speed, alone, should make him part of the Jays’ 2027 outfield mix in some fashion. His floor, as many evaluators suggested at the deadline, is a big-league fourth outfielder. The real question is whether Myles Straw will join him.

Even with some better play after the deadline, Straw still owns a .218 average and .267 wOBA on the season. His expected numbers (.257 xBA and .296 xwOBA) are much higher, a fact Straw and Toronto’s hitting coaches joke about often, but it still hasn’t been a great season for the 31-year-old. He knows, with an $8.5 million team option at the end of the season, these next seven weeks are an opportunity for Straw to earn his spot on next year’s team.

“Hopefully, things go well the next couple months,” Straw said. “I want to be able to come back here next year. However I’ve got to do that, to make someone happy up in the front office to come back, I’ll do that.”

Like Bateman, Straw has a high floor because of athleticism. He’s also one of the clubhouse’s most important characters and a leader Schneider asked to step up after veterans left at the deadline.

Maybe the Jays will look for more impact in centre next year, but the free-agent options appear bleak, and there might not be any fits on the trade market. There’s a real chance Toronto’s centre-field solution is already on the roster.

What Jameson Taillon did when he was designated for assignment

When Taillon was designated for assignment July 27, he booked a flight. The right-hander, after 15 sideways starts with the Chicago Cubs, flew down to Charlotte, N.C., looking for answers.

“I don’t want this to be a shot at anybody, but I just hadn’t really felt right for a while,” Taillon said. “We were trying everything with the Cubs, and we hit a point where it was the end of the road. Nothing was really changing. So I was like, ‘I’m gonna go take action and see if a different voice will help.’”

The 34-year-old, pausing the worst season of his MLB career, returned to his offseason workout facility, Tread Athletics. He worked on engaging his core and gaining momentum down the mound to increase velocity. He toyed with throwing his cutter harder, a pitch that has an expected slugging percentage of .801 against this year. He’s mixed in a gyro slider for a new weapon against lefties, too.

“Not having to worry about results for a week, just getting to worry about process and working on drills,” Taillon said. “I thought that was refreshing.”

Taillon still believes he has a lot left to offer an MLB pitching staff, despite his 5.92 ERA with the Cubs. He wasn’t ready to roll over and retire after 10 seasons. After three days in North Carolina, Taillon will get a chance to prove it with Toronto, acquired for future considerations a day before the deadline. His first shot came in Toronto’s 5-4 win over the Houston Astros last week.

It’s hard to say exactly how much changed after three days of drills and one start with the Jays. Taillon’s four-seam fastball velocity was up 0.7 miles per hour. His 16 harder cutters earned four whiffs on seven swings and resulted in one hard-hit ball. The gyro slider, Taillon said, wasn’t great, and his command was sporadic after 10 days without starting. He allowed three earned runs across four innings.

“I thought it was a little rusty,” Taillon said. “I thought my command was not what it is, typically, but I thought the stuff was pretty good and sharp. I just need to dial in the command going forward.”

With Trey Yesavage heading for a second opinion on his meniscus Monday and Spencer Arrighetti still working through foot problems, Taillon should get some run in Toronto’s rotation. His second chance to flash his post-DFA adjustments will come against the Boston Red Sox on Monday.

The Jeff Hoffman hole

Jeff Hoffman, at times, frustrated fans with blown saves and some well-documented homers allowed. But the righty’s deadline trade to the Minnesota Twins has left a clear hole in the Jays’ bullpen pecking order. Louis Varland still has the ninth, and Tyler Rogers should get most eighth innings, but there’s a hole in the seventh. That space has a trickle-down effect.

Even a week after the deadline, Hoffman remains second on the Jays in total batters faced in high-leverage situations (62). We’ve basically seen the entire bullpen thrust into leverage roles since the deadline, but Schneider pointed to Braydon Fisher, Mason Fluharty and Spencer Miles as the preferred options to step up.

“It’s an opportunity for different guys to step in and get some big outs,” Schneider said. “An opportunity to turn into someone like Jeff.”

All three of those options have shown flashes of being a true leverage relief option this year. Miles, as a reliever, owns a 1.93 ERA this season. In save situations this year, Fisher owns a 0.77 ERA. Fluharty has more appearances than any other reliever in baseball.

Actually filling Hoffman’s role isn’t really the Jays’ biggest challenge, though. The struggle comes when the innings that Miles, Fluharty and Fisher previously filled must be taken by somebody else. Toronto’s bullpen has elite weapons, but the depth has been up and down.

We saw the consequences of those new roles this weekend in Philadelphia, with plenty of fresh faces in leverage and stressful innings unfolding. Chase Lee took save situations, Lazaro Estrada saved a game in extras, and Brendon Little was called for big outs. That’s the sort of thing that will certainly continue. Either players embrace their new roles and succeed, or Hoffman’s absence will loom large.

SAN DIEGO — He had tried everything, even switching his slider grip without telling anyone. Houston Astros coaches caught it on Edgertronic cameras, corrected the error and convinced Bryan Abreu to stop seeking radical solutions to his struggles. “We don’t need to reinvent the wheel,” assistant pitching coach Ethan Katz told him.

So Abreu settled for a more subtle adjustment.

Amid the worst stretch of his eight major-league seasons, Abreu pulled up his pants and began to wear high socks. He did it at some point earlier in his Astros career, before he blossomed into one of baseball’s most dominant relievers. Bringing it back became a last-ditch effort to remain one.

“Feeling something new with the uniform,” Abreu said, “that definitely helps a lot to make me feel like I’m reset.”

Crediting high socks for a comeback is crazy, but this is baseball, a sport synonymous with superstitions that have little rhyme or reason. At his lowest point, Abreu said he “just had to switch” and try something — anything — to start anew. He exited April with a 12.54 ERA and no defined role in Houston’s bullpen or on its active roster.

“We can’t fix the past, but we can change the future,” Abreu said last week. “Everything that I’ve been doing was in the wrong direction, so we have to make something different so the future can come in the best way.”

Abreu carried that attitude across the most calamitous time of his career. Overcoming it has helped pilot Houston atop the American League West while resurrecting Abreu from the abyss.

Abreu has a 1.93 ERA since May 3, a stretch of 34 appearances that has saved his season and, perhaps, his standing as one of the best available relievers in next winter’s free-agent market.

“He’s a hard worker, not satisfied with mediocrity and wanting to be the best he can be,” closer Josh Hader said. “That’s a guy you want by your side no matter what. If you have a guy like that, it feeds the fire with everybody around.”

Abreu’s comeback coincided with Hader’s return from the injured list on June 2. Since that day, only the resurgent Boston Red Sox have a lower bullpen ERA than the Astros. Abreu and Hader have morphed back into the menacing, late-game duo Houston envisioned in spring training. The setup man and closer have combined to allow just nine earned runs across their past 48 2/3 innings.

Abreu allowed 13 earned runs in his first 11 appearances alone. The collapse ceded leverage innings to less experienced relievers and left Abreu to confront the first significant failure of his major-league career. “That can destroy you,” southpaw Steven Okert said. “You never know if they’re ever going to get back to normal or their previous self.”

“Some people who haven’t seen the struggles, it makes it harder. You don’t know how to deal with it.”

How Abreu handled it impressed those around this affable, 29-year-old right-hander, who has more riding on this season than most. This winter, Abreu is scheduled to reach free agency, where generational wealth may await. From 2022 to 2025, only four relievers were worth more wins above replacement than Abreu, according to FanGraphs: Griffin Jax, Emmanuel Clase, Edwin Diaz and Devin Williams.

Diaz and Williams have each signed free-agent contracts worth at least $48 million. Abreu does not have the closing experience of either man but matches both in performance and dominance. Paying Abreu something similar didn’t seem ludicrous, but his performance in March and April put that thought in serious peril.

“I never saw him once go, ‘Oh my God, I’m going to be a free agent,’” Katz said. “All the stuff that can really derail guys, I never thought he was thinking about those things, even though he probably was. He never let that show.

“We had some conversations to really let him know, ‘We’re going to get you back there, and we need you. If this team is going to go and this bullpen is going to go, we need to get the Bryan Abreu that’s always been there.’”

Doing so started with showing Abreu that version of him still existed. It is why coaches intervened when Abreu attempted to alter the grip on his signature slider. Reversing this spiral didn’t require a total overhaul, just tweaks to troubling trends that had begun to present themselves.

Abreu walked 16 batters in his first 11 1/3 innings. Flying open in his delivery left him misfiring with fastballs to his arm-side: up and in against right-handed hitters and away against lefties. Pitchers often get defects in their deliveries, but the way Abreu trains isn’t conducive to fixing it. He likes to throw — a lot — and most of it is on flat ground.

Katz and pitching coach Josh Miller believed it would be more beneficial for Abreu to abandon that routine and do all of his pregame work on the bullpen mound. Simulating a more game-like scenario would help Abreu feel the flaws — and fixes — in his delivery. Coaches put a stand-in dummy in the left-handed batter’s box, too, allowing Abreu to work on his pitch sequencing while implementing the adjustments in his delivery.

“That’s been the biggest part of getting him back on track,” Katz said.

The introduction of the ABS system shifted how hitters were approaching Abreu, a reliever who has always relied on chase more than command. Players around the sport are swinging less with the challenge system in place, putting Abreu in a bind.

Abreu threw just 51.7 percent of his pitches for strikes in April while generating a 20.4 percent chase rate. Abreu’s career chase rate is 27.8 percent. To throw more strikes, Abreu sacrificed some of his fastball velocity. His four-seam fastball averaged 95.1 mph in April and 94.4 mph in May. It sat 97.3 mph last season.

At the suggestion of Houston’s pitching coaches, Abreu introduced a cutter to come back inside the strike zone. It is a variation of his four-seam fastball and something that, according to Abreu, he has “the freedom to grab it and throw it through the strike zone.” Abreu’s teammate and close friend, Cristian Javier, is also experimenting with one.

“It’s a pitch that guys really trust in the zone really well, and it’s been a great add,” Katz said. “It’s kind of opened up everything.”

Abreu threw his first cutter in a June 2 outing against the Pittsburgh Pirates. In 23 appearances since, Abreu is throwing 63.6 percent of his pitches for strikes. He’s walked just eight batters across those 23 2/3 innings, during which Abreu’s four-seam fastball velocity has inched upward. He averaged 96.1 mph in both July and August.

After touching 99.1 mph in an outing this weekend against the San Diego Padres, Abreu gave a wide smile before saying, “It’s about time.”

“It’s the feeling that I’ve been looking for the whole season,” Abreu said. “To be able to have it, help the team, move forward and be able to go out there and compete, that’s an amazing feeling.”

Abreu is one of the most pleasant people in Houston’s clubhouse. That he maintained his disposition amid a disaster is of little surprise, but still impressive to a slew of veterans who wondered whether they would have been able to do so. Okert called it “incredible to watch him never get too down on himself.”

“The person never changed,” Katz said. “He’s always been a really good teammate. Guys look up to him, the way he goes about his business and I think everybody was pulling for him to get through this. Everybody has had his back and, with that, he felt the love, care and all that kind of stuff to be able to accelerate this process.”

The Atlanta Falcons are about two weeks into training camp, and that seemed like a good time for me to share my most pertinent thoughts. Let’s dive in.

Quarterback questions

I tried to come up with a sunnier way to say this, but quarterback is a mess at the moment. Tua Tagovailoa is coming off one of his worst professional seasons and was limited for the first seven practices by back tightness he began experiencing for the first time in his career shortly before training camp. You can’t question Tagovailoa’s toughness. In his career, he has had a high ankle sprain that required surgery, a hip dislocation that also required surgery and multiple concussions. He’s the strong favorite to start Week 1 at this point, but his injury history is not comforting.

Michael Penix Jr. (left ACL) still hasn’t been cleared for 11-on-11 work in practice, and he told reporters Wednesday he did not have a follow-up appointment scheduled with the surgeon who will sign off on his full participation. Penix, who has a tattered injury history of his own, is improving but trying to remain patient, he said.

“I’m running my own race,” he said. “I just have to take it one day at a time and focus on what I can control. Right now I can’t control not being out there.”

Meanwhile, training camp addition Cooper Rush seems to be slowly nudging out Jack Strand in the rotation, which was expected considering Rush is an eight-year NFL veteran. Rush and Strand split reps with the second team in 11-on-11 work during Saturday night’s practice at Lanier High School.

Overall, the quarterbacks’ results on the practice field are as smooth as you would expect, considering the jumbled rotation, intermittent availability and four quarterbacks learning a new offense. Saturday night, at least, provided some optimism as Tagovailoa was sharp and had nice throws for big gains to Olamide Zaccheaus and Drake London.

Get well (really) soon

The Kansas City Chiefs may be about to start an undrafted rookie free agent, Kahlil Benson, at right tackle. Why does that matter for the Falcons? Because both of Kansas City’s right tackles from the last two years are in Atlanta. The Chiefs allowed Jawaan Taylor to leave via free agency and then traded Wanya Morris to the Falcons in June for a late-round pick swap. That Kansas City didn’t want to hold on to either player is not comforting, given its current state at the position.

The worst part is neither guy is playing right tackle for Atlanta right now. Taylor has not practiced with the team since signing because he is recovering from elbow and triceps injuries suffered last season. Head coach Kevin Stefanski said Taylor is attending all the team’s walkthroughs and meetings and is “close” to returning. Morris, who has missed several days due to a lower-body injury, has worked mostly at left tackle so far, although Stefanski said he will train on both sides.

So who are the Falcons’ right tackles right now? Michael Jerrell, a third-year sixth-round pick with three NFL starts; Brandon Walton, a fourth-year former undrafted free agent with two NFL starts; and Ethan Onianwa, the Falcons’ seventh-round pick this year.

General manager Ian Cunningham and his staff are almost certainly scouting the other 31 training camps for right tackles who might get cut when rosters are trimmed to 53 later this month.

This could be fun

There might be hope we won’t have to watch one of the worst screen games in the NFL this year, so that’ll be nice. Under Stefanski and offensive line coach Bill Callahan, the Falcons seem committed to improving. They are at least putting in the time at practice.

Atlanta is dedicating 10-minute chunks of practice to screens during some practices, left tackle Jake Matthews said.

“Callahan always says, ‘Every screen is different.’ You are never going to get two of the same. It’s really important to practice every type of look you can get,” he said. “You can run the exact same look, and it can play out three different ways.”

The Falcons ranked 26th in the league in EPA per pass play on screens (minus-.25) the last two years, according to TruMedia. It’s not that they didn’t try them. They were 13th in that span with 80 screen completions. They just didn’t work. Atlanta got only 5.8 percent of its passing yards from screens, a mark that ranked 29th in the league.

“The more you get confidence with the guys next to you, those plays can pop and they can be really, really explosive,” Matthews said.

With Bijan Robinson and Zachariah Branch, the Falcons seem well suited to heavy use of screens.

Waiting on the league

I’m worried many Falcons fans aren’t prepared for the length of suspension James Pearce Jr. is going to get. I would expect the league to announce his punishment under the personal conduct policy before rosters are trimmed at the end of this month. It’s going to be at least eight games, in my opinion. Based on the league’s previous rulings in similar situations and the details of Pearce’s February arrest and subsequent three felony charges, I wouldn’t be shocked if it was more.

Atlanta doesn’t appear to be planning on having Pearce early in the season. He has worked mostly with the third team so far, although Saturday night he took some snaps with the first and second units.

The deal maker

I’m good with Cunningham being aggressive on new contracts to lock up the team’s young offensive players. The Robinson and London deals were no-brainers. The Kyle Pitts and Matthew Bergeron contracts can be debated, but Cunningham looks like he got ahead of the market (or at least not behind it) on both deals.

One day after the Falcons made Pitts the third-highest-paid tight end in the league ($18 million), the Jaguars paid Brenton Strange $12 million a year. Strange has 986 receiving yards in three seasons. Less than a week after Atlanta made Bergeron the highest-paid guard in the league ($24 million per year), the Titans topped it with Peter Skoronski’s deal ($25 million per year), continuing a trend of skyrocketing salaries for the position in the last year.

If Pitts and Bergeron don’t perform at the level expected of players making that kind of money, Cunningham will get dinged for it. Right now, these are sensible deals.

The London, Robinson and Pitts contracts have a combined 15 void years tacked on the end, according to OverTheCap.com. The full details of the Bergeron deal aren’t available yet, but it’s likely similar. Void years are essentially extra seasons added to the end of contracts, allowing the salary cap hit to be spread out. Bryce Johnston, Atlanta’s senior vice president of football administration (cap guy), came from Philadelphia, which has used void years liberally to build its roster.

Those void years are one reason Atlanta is projected to have the second-most available salary cap space in the league in 2027 even after all the new deals.

Bright spots at linebacker

Christian Harris is not quite a lock to start at middle linebacker. Rookies Kendal Daniels and Harold Perkins Jr. each got more time with the starters in practice last week. That may be the coaching staff getting a good look at them before they have to start making depth chart decisions, but it could mean more.

Harris, a third-round pick of the Texans in 2022 who has 27 career starts, is still the favorite to start Week 1 simply because of experience, but it’s good news for Atlanta that the young guys are coming along.

Pads popping

The live tackling at Falcons practices is new, and probably a preview of a change in the preseason plan. Atlanta did not have any live tackling in its training camp practices under previous head coaches Arthur Smith and Raheem Morris, but Stefanski has a different philosophy.

“I think there is a way to work hard and work smart and practice live because that’s what the game is,” he said. “I think there’s a way to do it safely. I think the guys understand how to do that the right way. You’re still not taking a shot on one of your teammates, but like I’ve said before, to get ready to play football, you have to play football.”

Stefanski also plans to play starters in the first and third preseason games, another break from tradition in Atlanta. Penix only threw 16 preseason passes in his rookie year and did not play in the preseason at all last year.

London believes the more physical preseason approach will pay dividends.

“Callousing our body up to go in and play an actual game is really good for us,” the wide receiver said. “I’m excited we’re doing it.”

Cash money

Cash Jones still looks like one of those undrafted free agents who is hard to get rid of. After working with the wide receivers in the spring, he’s at his natural position, running back, this fall.

“Playing running back and wide receiver, what we’re doing there is testing the limits of what he can handle mentally, and he passed all of those,” Stefanski said.

“Cash is smooth,” London said.

Mixing and matching

Especially now that the versatile Jalon Walker is lost for the season, I expect Atlanta’s front seven personnel to be very situationally dependent this year. Every defensive coach would love to have defenders with a varied enough skill set to do everything, but that’s not how this team is built at the moment.

What does that mean? On run downs, I’d expect to see a lot of guys like Cameron Thomas and Bralen Trice at outside linebacker with guys like Da’Shawn Hand and Maason Smith, and a heavy dose of Brandon Dorlus, Samson Ebukam and Azeez Ojulari on passing downs. Smith blew up a red zone play Saturday in what was probably the defensive highlight of the day. (Also, keep an eye on tackle Chris Williams, a former UDFA who had a couple of breakout seasons the last couple of years in Chicago.)

Extra points

Avieon Terrell has some ground to close to earn a starting job in the secondary. With Billy Bowman still on the physically unable to perform list, Darnay Holmes, Sydney Brown and A.J. Woods have all gotten more work as the first-team nickel so far. … It’s notable that Corey Levin appears to be on the first-team field goal unit. Levin has gotten some work at second-team center recently, so his spot on special teams may be a tell. Levin is a six-year vet with a lot of versatility. … I’ve enjoyed seeing DeMarcco Hellams getting some first-team work at safety with Jessie Bates out. Hellams is not a threat to Bates or Xavier Watts, but it’s fun to watch him hit people. … Matt Ryan has filed his retirement paperwork. I checked just to be sure. … It might be time to give up on sixth-round defensive tackle Anterio Thompson being a Falcon this year, or maybe ever. He’s still not with the team due to an issue Stefanski said the team is “working through.”