TORONTO — Darwin Barney sat in front of his locker Saturday afternoon, trying to figure out why he was being mentioned so much on social media. On an afternoon when Clayton Kershaw kept one of MLB’s strongest right-handed lineups mute if not entirely silent, Barney’s third consecutive multi-hit game seemed to have caught people’s attention.
Man. One guy on your team flips a bat in a big game and seven months later you end up having to explain a rather modest display of emotion: a mini-flip, in this case, after a run-scoring single in the second inning to tie the game.
“I was just excited to get a hit off (Kershaw,)” a puzzled Barney said following the Toronto Blue Jays‘ 6-2 loss to Kershaw and the Los Angeles Dodgers in front of a sellout crowd of 47,156 at Rogers Centre. “You’re not going to go 3-for-4 off of him. My goal was just to scratch out one hit that meant something, whether it was to drive in a run or just get on base. You’re going to get, maybe, one chance against him. You need to make it count.”
The Los Angeles TV broadcast team suggested Barney had said something in the direction of the Dodgers dugout; odd since Barney played 24 games with the Dodgers between 2014-2015 before joining the Blue Jays in a trade and, in fact, planned to meet up with some of his teammates after Saturday’s game. But just to make sure, Barney texted the Dodgers’ Joc Pederson to say he hadn’t meant anything by the flip, that he wasn’t pimping the single. Kershaw told Pederson he was cool with it, that all was good.
Replays did show Barney yelling and glancing quickly into the dugout, but he was then shown chatting with first baseman Adrian Gonzalez. Kershaw, who’d given up a leadoff single to Justin Smoak, was actually more demonstrative, yelling in anger as Smoak scooted home to tie the game.
“No way I’d show anybody up,” Barney said. “Especially those guys.”
Pederson had given the Dodgers a 1-0 lead off R.A. Dickey (1-4) in the top of the inning with a 430-foot-plus home run into the WestJet Flight Deck, and three singles, an error to Barney and a passed ball in the third gave them a 4-1 lead they’d never relinquish. Justin Turner homered off Chad Girodo in the eighth and Carl Crawford picked up a sacrifice fly in the ninth on a drive into the gap in left-centre that Kevin Pillar turned into another highlight video catch, getting a rug burn underneath his right eye as he landed head-first on the artificial turf.
Barney scored the Blue Jays’ second run on a Pillar double.
“I was glad I was able to make an adjustment after the first two at-bats and slow down a bit,” said Pillar, who has six RBI in his last three games and has gone for extra bases on 10 of his last 26 hits.
Barney’s second-inning single was the first hit that Kershaw has allowed this season with two out and runners in scoring position. It was only the ninth time he faced such a situation. Kershaw gave up eight of the nine Blue Jays hits and recorded his fourth consecutive game with 10 strikeouts and issued no walks, extending his streak of walk-less starts to three consecutive, over 23 innings. Seven of the Blue Jays hits were singles.
Dickey gave up six hits in seven innings. Only two of the four runs he allowed were earned. The Dodgers didn’t exactly square him up in their three-run frame.
“The ball got away from Josh and there were some quick singles,” said Dickey, who hung around enough to record his longest outing of the season. “Facing Kershaw is like facing Sale,” he said, referring to Chicago White Sox starter Chris Sale. “You need to buckle down. I didn’t arrest the damage in that inning, but as I’m sure Clayton would tell you: no ballplayer is immune from the game. I didn’t think I needed to be perfect, but I knew I’d need to pitch well.”
Dickey called Kershaw a “once in a generation pitcher.” Added his manager, John Gibbons: “You have to play almost the perfect game to beat him. Early, we were hoping that maybe he’d last just five or six innings and we’d get him out of there.”
The Blue Jays did put together some battling at-bats against Kershaw, whose 112 pitches was just four away from his season high. But he set down the Blue Jays on just 11 pitches in the sixth, and followed up with another 11-pitch seventh, getting Smoak to hit into a double play on one pitch.
Barney’s run-scoring single came after Michael Saunders hit into one of three Blue Jays double plays on the day. But even with the early run, Barney didn’t think it was going to be a short outing for Kershaw.
“You need more than one run off him,” Barney said, chuckling. “Giving up one run … that’s not going to faze him. Not at all.”
Barney has proven to be an early-season revelation for the Blue Jays, and is now being utilized in a second-base platoon with left-hand hitting Ryan Goins. Six of his 14 games with at least one plate appearance have been multi-hit games, and Barney and Jose Bautista were the only Blue Jays to not strike out at least once against Kershaw.
Pillar, meanwhile, has hit his stride again after being dropped down the lineup and has worked his way back to a platoon leadoff role with Saunders. Gibbons admits there is a chance Pillar could go back into the leadoff spot if he stays hot – the Blue Jays would like Saunders’ lefty bat to break up the righty middle of the lineup – but for now Gibbons plans on leaving well enough alone.
Pillar credits “learning to trust my eyes,” with a role in his resurgence.
“I don’t look at it as being hot,” Pillar said. “I look at it as being consistent.”
Kershaw against Dickey screamed unfavourable matchup, and the truth is, the Blue Jays probably accomplished a little more than they anticipated against him. They will now try to win their sixth of eight series at home Sunday afternoon with Marco Estrada on the mound against Ross Stripling — their chances of making some noise with more than body language likely better.
