BOSTON – Already struggling to shake their lingering early-season doldrums at the plate, the Toronto Blue Jays were also faced with rousing themselves unusually early for a rare 11:05 a.m. start on Marathon Monday in Boston. For seven innings, they hit like a team picking sleep from its eyes, too, with the erratic Clay Buchholz inducing four double-play grounders, three of them by Jose Bautista to match an unwanted club record. The funk looked destined to live on.
Then, a dormant offence awoke, with the suddenly scorching Kevin Pillar serving as the catalyst for a four-run eighth that may very well be the club’s best offensive inning of the season, paving the way to a 4-3 victory, and four-game split with the Red Sox. While the combination of two hits, three walks and a hit-by-pitch isn’t the Blue Jays’ usual formula for a crooked number on the scoreboard, the tenacity of their at-bats against Koji Uehara and Craig Kimbrel is an important takeaway.
Teams don’t drop an inning like that on elite relievers unless they’re doing plenty right.
“It was good at-bat after good at-bat,” said Russell Martin, whose two-run single off Craig Kimbrel ended up being the difference. “Guys were making the other pitchers work, laying off some tough pitches, some borderline off-speed pitches that were just fading when they were getting close to the plate. I’m thinking of Jose laying off the 3-2 splittie, [Justin] Smoak same thing, so it definitely was a collective effort.”
The late rally ensured another strong start from J.A. Happ didn’t go to waste. The left-hander surrendered a run on Josh Rutledge’s two-out double in the second and then allowed only a walk and a single over the next five innings, erasing both on double plays.
He looked set to end up a hard-luck loser, with the Blue Jays limping into Baltimore for three games versus the Orioles on a downer, before they delivered their first comeback when trailing after seven innings in six tries.
“That was a huge, huge inning for us against tough pitchers and we had some great at-bats,” said Happ. “Guys weren’t trying to do too much.”
Pillar, who went 3-for-3 with a walk, opened the eighth with a chopper down the third-base line, hustled to first and took second when Rutledge’s wild throw rolled out of play. Smoak then pinch-hit for Ezequiel Carrera and after falling behind 0-2 to Uehara, rallied to work a walk. Despite just one hit in 12 at-bats, Smoak has six walks in 18 plate appearances and an on-base percentage of .389.
Michael Saunders followed and when he squared to bunt, Uehara missed high off Christian Vazquez’s glove allowing the runners to advance. Saunders followed with a grounder to second that scored Pillar and tied things up. Uehara next hit Josh Donaldson in the back and Bautista fell behind 0-2 before rallying to work a walk in an eight-pitch at-bat, loading the bases.
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Red Sox manager John Farrell understandably turned to Kimbrel, and the all-world closer struck out Edwin Encarnacion on three straight 99 mph fastballs. He then had Troy Tulowitzki 1-2 before the shortstop took a slider low and away and worked a go-ahead RBI walk. Martin followed and after fouling off three full-count pitches – each at 97 mph – he lashed a base hit to right field that broke the inning open.
“We do that,” manager John Gibbons said of the tenacious at-bats. “We’ve been striking out a lot, but we’ve also been working pitchers all year, too, for the most part. I will say I thought the home-plate umpire [Will Little] had a great game, I really did. He was calling strikes, strikes, and balls, balls, and you tip your hat to him because then you’ve got a good idea of what you’re looking for, what you can take and what you need to swing at. Good way to end four games here that didn’t start out too well.”
For Tulowitzki and Martin, two key Blue Jays hitters who’ve been grinding hard but have started looking better in the box, the plate appearances could be pivotal.
“It was a good team inning for us because everybody contributed, we were down, J.A. pitched great the whole time so we kept talking about it in the dugout, wanting to put some runs on the board for him,” said Tulowitzki. “Eleven o’clock game, it could have been easy to roll out here, say we got beat. The team didn’t quit, it goes a long way, hopefully we can build off this and play [well] in Baltimore.”
Gibbons started Bautista at DH for a maintenance day but pushed him out to right field in the bottom of the eighth in place of Carrera, because there were no other outfielders on the bench. His defence wasn’t needed but Pillar’s was, as the centre-fielder charged in to make a diving catch on Jackie Bradley Jr.’s fading liner.
With Roberto Osuna unavailable after a blister by the fingernail on his right middle finger popped while throwing the pitch Travis Shaw hit for a two-run homer Sunday, Drew Storen came in to close things out in the ninth, allowing a run-scoring double to Travis Shaw and RBI single to Hanley Ramirez before catching David Ortiz looking.
The crowd chanted “Papi, Papi” throughout the at-bat, but Storen held tough for his first save with the Blue Jays.
“That’s the thing I like about being a bullpen guy, that’s what it’s all about, honestly,” said Storen. “That’s when you can really lock in, when everything is so loud, I prefer that over a quiet stadium. That’s a lot of the fun of pitching on the road, especially in that kind of situation. … It worked out, those are the fun ones you remember.”
The Blue Jays had reason to remember this one, salvaging a series that started like one to forget.
