TORONTO – Four times the Toronto Blue Jays took leads. Four times their pitchers gave the advantage back, all but once in the inning that immediately followed. They played poor defence. But they crushed the ball at the plate. Boy, did they crush the ball at the plate.
No one crushed it more than Josh Donaldson, who delivered the decisive blow, a three-run, walk-off homer against David Robertson to cap a wild 10-9 win over the Chicago White Sox that averted yet another lost night, and yet another addition to the already too long list of games to slip away.
"Magic," is how manager John Gibbons described it. "How many times have I talked about magic."
Quite a few, actually, and Donaldson certainly delivered some during what in some ways was a signature performance. He managed to erase an evening of poor pitching and porous defence with one swing, having already opened the scoring in the first with a solo shot and scoring three times on Jose Bautista doubles that provided short-lived leads of 3-2 in the third, 6-5 in the fifth and 7-6 in the seventh.
Up in the ninth after a Josh Thole single and Jose Reyes double, he took a 94 mph fastball from David Robertson for a ball and swung through a 93 mph heater for a strike before snapping a 94 mph four-seamer that leaked back over the heart of the plate over the wall in right.
Boom, mob scene at home plate.
"After I swung through the fastball I was kind of sitting curveball a little bit," said Donaldson, "but my eyes had already seen two heaters right there, and I was just able to make the adjustment real quick and was fortunate enough to hit it out."
So too were the Blue Jays, who instead of facing a third blown contest during their current homestand, matched a season-high with a third straight victory, ended a streak of six straight losses in one-run games, and collected their first victory when trailing after eight innings.
This was precisely the kind of game they must stop giving away.
"As a player playing in the game you understand the process of what’s going on and what’s happening," said Donaldson. "We’ve kind of run into a little bit of tough luck where the ball doesn’t fall our way, but that said, you know there’s light at the end of the tunnel.
"We just have too much ability in this room for it to not come out."
Certainly the pairing of Donaldson and Bautista, back in the lineup at DH following a cortisone shot Sunday, has the potential to carry the Blue Jays.
They were unstoppable Tuesday, with nine RBIs between them.
"Regardless of the pitcher that’s out there, they pose a real threat," said R.A. Dickey. "When we have Reyes back and it slots everybody in the right place in the order, it’s really difficult for a pitcher and I can speak from experience when you’re facing a lineup like that. There’s no real breathing room."
Dickey started and was looking to build off a superb outing his last time out following some mechanical adjustments, but wasn’t nearly as sharp, grinding through five innings of five-run ball.
Some crisper play in the field would likely have trimmed down that total, as one of the four potential double-play balls the Blue Jays failed to convert with him on the mound. A Melky Cabrera bloop to right that fell in between Chris Colabello and Steve Tolleson also preceded Jose Abreu’s three-run shot in the fifth that put the White Sox up 5-3.
"I’m still taking baby steps. Through the first 10 starts here I feel like I’ve been the weak link in the chain, I don’t think that’s going to continue through the year, but it’s nice to be able to win a baseball game," said Dickey. "There are better days to come for me and I’m right there walking the razor’s edge, I know it, I’m really close and I feel pretty good so I’m going to take a lot of positives out of the game.
"I had another consistent swing and miss knuckleball, late movement, I didn’t execute a fastball to Abreu, he made me pay for it, outside of that I felt pretty good."
Ryan Tepera took over in the sixth after Thole’s RBI double and Bautista’s two-run double put the Blue Jays back up 6-5, and promptly allowed a double and a hit by pitch to open the inning. Aaron Loup came on and induced back-to-back grounders that weren’t turned into double plays, Melky Cabrera beating out the second one on a play that the Blue Jays challenged to allow the tying run to score.
After Roberto Osuna pitched a scoreless seventh, Liam Hendriks couldn’t keep a 7-6 advantage under wraps either, as a one-out Sanchez double was cashed in by an Adam Eaton single, Abreu fielder’s choice, on an overturned 4-6-3 double play call, put the White Sox ahead, and Alexei Ramirez’s single made it a 9-7 lead.
Still, that wasn’t enough for Robertson, who after snuffing out a rally in the eighth blew his second save of the season on Donaldson’s second walk-off homer of the year. The other came April 18 in the 10th inning against Atlanta.
"It’s so hard to come through with walk-off hits, those are rare," said Gibbons. "But some guys thrive for that moment. And he’s got that mindset. He’s one of those guys, he wants to be the guy, the hero. He’s done it many times. Pressure situations in baseball, ability to come through, and you don’t do it all the time, but it’s what separates a lot of guys. …
"That’s just the way he functions. And you can hear it. You could say, how do I know that? Just talking to him. And hearing him talk. You’re down in the game and he just keeps pounding. For nine innings, whatever it is, he’s very intense and confident."
Once again the Blue Jays kept pounding, too, pounding all their troubles away en route to victory.