The Toronto Blue Jays expanded their roster by 10 heading into the season’s final month, needing a September To Remember in order to get themselves back into the race for a playoff spot.
The first step was taken in the right direction with a win in St. Petersburg that didn’t have anything to do with the new guys.
R.A. Dickey and Jose Reyes stepped to the forefront of the Jays’ series-opening win – the first time they’d won a series opener in their last nine attempts – and as a result of a 8-2 clubbing of Tampa Bay, the Blue Jays have their first three-game win streak in over a month. They didn’t win three in a row at any point in their apocalyptic August. The last time the Jays had strung more than two consecutive wins together was as part of a six-game win streak from July 25-31.
Dickey had the knuckleball working brilliantly over his seven innings of two-hitter. It was so good that catcher Josh Thole was helpless on more than a few occasions, including when the third strike to the Rays’ first batter of the game got by him, allowing Ben Zobrist to reach on a passed ball. There would be another Thole passed ball, and a Dickey wild pitch, but neither wound up factoring into the scoring.
The knuckleballer wound up allowing just two hits over seven strong innings of work, both of them in the second inning. One hit was a little dying quail that just found its way in between the converging trio of Reyes, Kevin Pillar and Jose Bautista for an RBI single.
For all the criticism he has taken for not living up to his Cy Young billing, Dickey has been a big piece of the Blue Jays’ rotation this season, just as he was last year. He’s well on his way to surpassing 200 innings yet again, and has answered the bell every fifth day.
After a shaky first four starts in April, in which he was lit up badly three times and from which he emerged with a 6.26 ERA, Dickey has pitched to a more-than-solid 3.61 ERA over his last 25 starts. There has been some help from the bullpen, to be sure, but far more often than not Dickey has given the Blue Jays a quality start and a chance to win that has not been taken advantage of by his teammates, as is obvious by his 10-11 record over that span.
He’s not been nearly the pitcher he was in his magical 2012 with the Mets, but Dickey’s been a very good major-league starter in a difficult division. Does that make it worth having parted with Noah Syndergaard, who has yet to throw a pitch in the big leagues, and Travis d’Arnaud, who has sputtered in his rookie season in the majors? Only time will tell.
The cost in prospects to acquire Dickey was great indeed, but he’s given the Blue Jays quality far more often than not, having allowed three earned runs or fewer in 19 of those last 25 starts. The first caller on Tuesday night’s edition of BlueJaysTalk (calling from Kazakhstan, no less) mentioned that he doesn’t believe Dickey gets the credit he’s due, and he’s right.
Dickey hasn’t been great, but he’s been very good, and durable; very good starting pitchers aren’t easy to find.
As for Reyes, his contribution came with one big swing – a three-run home run on a full-count pitch with one out in the top of the fourth that turned a 2-1 deficit into a 5-2 lead, and the Blue Jays could afford to go into cruise control from that point on, mostly because the Rays didn’t get another hit the rest of the way.
The Blue Jays have been a team that lives and dies by the home run, and for the second straight game they hit three big flies. Danny Valencia, who now appears to be the everyday third baseman, and Dioner Navarro also went deep, but Jose Bautista didn’t.
Bautista had a pair of singles, ending his streak of five consecutive games with a home run, one off the club record held by Jose Cruz, Jr.
As for the September call-ups, Ryan Goins came in defensively in the sixth inning and hit an RBI triple in the three-run eighth that put the game away, while Anthony Gose checked in for defence in the ninth and didn’t have to make a play. Gose and Goins are the two position players who are expected to see the bulk of the playing time among the call-ups.
Not expected to play much is surprise call-up Dalton Pompey, but the Mississauga, Ont., native made his major-league debut in the top of the ninth, pinch-running for Edwin Encarnacion. Pompey went from first to third with inordinate ease on a Steve Tolleson single, but was stranded there. That slight glimpse of him showed that he’s going to be awfully fun to watch.
The Blue Jays’ first September step was a win, one that drew them to within half a game of two of the teams they need to leap in the wild card race. Their next step, if they can manage to win one of the next two games in St. Petersburg, will be to pick up their first road series win against the Rays since April of 2007.