Scherzer explains how his Toronto Blue Jays teammate pranked the media
The Toronto Blue Jays are rolling, and they’re keeping things light by pranking the media at the expense of Max Scherzer.
Fans might have noticed lately that fellow Blue Jays pitcher Eric Lauer is sporting a pretty gnarly injury on his lips. On Friday, Lauer met with the media and said that the busted lip was courtesy of Scherzer punching him in the face while messing up a pre-game routine.
Lauer kept a pretty straight face while saying it, prompting many to believe it.
“There’s this know thing to not mess with Scherzer on his start days, especially when he has his headphones in, and I broke that rule,” Lauer said. “I tried to talk to him a little too early, and six stitches is what you get for that.”
"There's this known thing to not mess with [Max] Scherzer on his start days, especially when he has his headphones in, and I broke that rule. I tried to talk to him a little too early."
Eric Lauer on his busted lip 😳 pic.twitter.com/RdIu10Bleu
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) July 25, 2025
It would have been a troubling revelation for the Blue Jays if true. The team is rolling as the best team in baseball, and having any sort of bad blood in the locker room would put them at risk of losing their groove.
Luckily, it turned out to be an elaborate prank by Lauer. When asked about the incident in an interview with Sportsnet’s Hazel Mae, Scherzer cracked a smile and cleared the air. Toronto pitcher Chris Bassitt also had a role in crafting the story alongside Lauer.
“No, I did not punch Eric Lauer in the face,” Scherzer said with a laugh. “I guess Eric had something wrong with his lip and he had to the doctor, or something like that, so I guess [Chris Bassitt] and him were sitting and talking.
“Bass is saying, ‘Dude, you can’t go to the media and say you have something wrong with your lip, we gotta come up with a better story’… So they say, ‘Alright, let’s blame Max.’ It’s a believable story.”
Scherzer did confirm that he does have a rule for teammates not to mess with him when he has his headphones in, making this a plausible scenario.
This didn’t blindside Scherzer, as Lauer told the veteran pitcher what he was going to say before he said it. Although the 41-year-old is an intense guy, he thought it was a hilarious idea, but he had his doubts that Lauer could believably pull it off.
“To his credit, he kept a straight face; he even deked you out,” Scherzer told Mae. “It’s all fun and games… They found a way to bring this out, have fun with it. I think it’s hysterical; my wife thought it was hysterical.
“My phone’s been blowing up nonstop over it; everybody actually thinks I’ve punched Eric Lauer in the face. I haven’t. Laughs all around, kudos to those guys.”
The fact that this Blue Jays team can get such an intense guy like Scherzer to laugh off what could have been a serious accusation in the media is a good sign. This is a tight-knit group that trusts each other, is playing good baseball, and is having fun while doing so.
With the team holding a demanding lead in the AL East, the hope is that they can continue having fun down the stretch.