Players · V · Pitcher · 2026 regular season

Louis Varland

Age: 29
B/T: L/R
Height: 6' 1"
Weight: 205 lb
Number: #77

Born: December 9, 1997 in St. Paul, MN, United States
MLB debut: September 7, 2022
Drafted: 2019, round 15
College: Concordia-St.Paul

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dbWAR: 3.9
IP: 78.0
ERA: 1.27
FIP: 1.83
K/9: 11.2
FIP−: 44

Louis Varland is a relief pitcher for the Toronto Blue Jays. In 2026 he struck out 97 batters over 78.0 innings across 71 appearances, going 5-6. His ERA of 1.27 was 69.6% lower than the league average of 4.18 — the best on his team, and the third best among MLB pitchers with 20+ innings. Stripping out defence, his 1.83 FIP suggests that his ERA had some help behind him. He missed bats on 29.3% of swings (15.2% of every pitch he threw), walked 7.5% of the batters he faced and struck out 31.6%. His 2.6 dbWAR is built from that FIP rather than runs allowed, so it credits him for what he controls and not for the defence behind him.

League context

Percentile among qualified pitchers, 2026 regular season.

FIP1.83

K/911.2

WHIP1.00

WAR2.6

WAR by season

Pitching Regular season

Standard and advanced, by season. Regular-season games only — postseason games are listed separately below.


2026	TOR	71	0	78.0	5	6	35	55	11	97	23	1.27	1.83	1.00	11.2	2.7	30	44	2.6
2025	MIN/TOR	74	1	72.2	4	3	0	65	24	75	22	2.97	3.14	1.20	9.3	2.7	71	75	1.4
2024	MIN	16	7	49.2	0	6	0	68	42	49	16	7.61	5.54	1.69	8.9	2.9	187	136	-0.4
2023	MIN	17	10	68.0	4	3	0	66	35	71	17	4.63	5.02	1.22	9.4	2.3	107	116	0.1
2022	MIN	5	5	26.0	1	2	0	26	11	21	6	3.81	4.30	1.23	7.3	2.1	96	108	0.2

Separate from the regular season

Postseason Postseason

Wild Card through World Series. These games are counted on their own: none of them are in the regular-season tables, career totals, league context, leaderboards or dbWAR on this page.

Postseason pitching

Postseason Louis Varland's postseason pitching, by October and round. Not part of any regular-season figure on this page.
Season	Team	Round	G	GS	IP	L	H	ER	HR	BB	SO	ERA	WHIP	K/9
2025 Post	TOR	Postseason total	15	1	16.0	1	14	7	4	3	17	3.94	1.06	9.6
		ALDS	4	1	4.0	1	4	2	2	0	5	4.50	1.00	11.3
		ALCS	6	0	7.0	0	4	2	2	1	8	2.57	0.71	10.3
		World Series	5	0	5.0	0	6	3	0	2	4	5.40	1.60	7.2
2023 Post	MIN	Wild Card	2	0	0.2	0	2	0	0	0	1	0.00	3.00	13.5
Career		Postseason total · 2 Octobers	17	1	16.2	1	16	7	4	3	18	3.78	1.14	9.7

Box-score and rate statistics only. wOBA, wRC+, FIP and dbWAR are measured against a full league season, and a postseason is a few teams playing each other for a month, so they are not computed for October.

Platoon splits

How left- and right-handed hitters fare against him.

Season

Opponent batting by the side the hitter bats from, 2026. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
Split	PA	AB	H	HR	BB	SO	AVG	OBP	SLG	wOBA	K%
vs LHB	172	159	32	0	11	52	.201	.251	.233	.221	30.2%
vs RHB	135	121	23	2	12	45	.190	.259	.264	.241	33.3%

Pitch sequencing

What Louis Varland throws in each count, and what he follows each pitch with. Select any cell for the breakdown.

ShowBatter

Four-seamKnuckle curveChangeupSliderSinker

Select a count to see exactly what Louis Varland throws in it.

Pitch arsenal

What he throws, how hard, how often it misses, and what hitters do with it.

Season


Four-Seam Fastball	41.2%	509	98.8	2,273	60.7%	24.4%	115	.191	.509
Knuckle Curve	30.3%	375	87.7	2,553	44.3%	34.8%	85	.247	.611
Changeup	18.0%	223	93.1	1,702	47.5%	38.5%	57	.123	.276
Slider	8.1%	100	92.1	2,497	53.0%	19.6%	20	.150	.427
Sinker	2.3%	29	97.1	2,138	31.0%	0.0%	4	—	—

Louis Varland's arsenal by usage. Velocity is average release speed in mph, spin in rpm, and whiff rate is misses per swing — the cleanest single measure of whether a pitch beats hitters. BAA and OPS are what hitters did against each pitch, credited to the one that ended the plate appearance, and are left blank under 15 at-bats.

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Similar players

Nearest 2026 seasons by command, run prevention and role, on rate statistics rather than totals.

Josh HaderHOU

ERA: 1.01
FIP: 1.94
SO: 55
WAR: 1.4

Cade SmithCLE

ERA: 1.95
FIP: 2.18
SO: 107
WAR: 2.2

Anthony BenderMIA

ERA: 2.62
FIP: 2.40
SO: 41
WAR: 0.9

Garrett WhitlockBOS

ERA: 1.72
FIP: 2.11
SO: 59
WAR: 1.6

How these are computed

wOBA uses linear weights measured from this season's own play-by-play rather than published constants, and wRC+ is park-adjusted against that same league. dbWAR is our own open implementation — not fWAR or bWAR — and the full derivation, including its simplifications, is on the methodology page.