TORONTO — John Schneider often talks about winning in the margins and executing to the situation and just like the past couple of years, the Toronto Blue Jays made both mantras focal points during spring training. Over time, the thinking goes, the little things slowly contribute in bits and pieces to wins here and there, adding up to an impactful sum.
Or sometimes, bunch them up all at once to drive a victory, the way they did Friday night in a 3-1 win over the Seattle Mariners.
At the plate, two sacrifice flies, some clever baserunning and a well-executed RBI single by Alejandro Kirk through a drawn-in infield took care of the offence. In the field, three laser-beam throws from right field by Addison Barger helped Bowden Francis get through six innings with only one run against, while Kirk throwing out Julio Rodriguez trying to steal second negated a rally in the eighth. All of it led to another lockdown ninth by Jeff Hoffman, before a sellout crowd of 40,263 as the Blue Jays improved to (12-8).
“Ideally you get a little bit of separation but that's just a good all-around win from defence to at-bats early, baserunning, underrated things,” said Schneider. “It was really, really tight tonight. That's how you kind of get on a little bit of a roll until you really start scoring some runs.”
Now at seven wins in their past 10 outings, including three in a row against Spencer Schwellenbach, Spencer Strider and now Bryan Woo, the Blue Jays are on a roll, and it’s largely been underpinned by strong pitching and defence with timely execution.
That they’re finding ways to win without a consistent flow of home runs “tells me that we're a good team and to be a good team you have to be able to win games when it's not easy,” said Bo Bichette, who created a run in the first with a single and clever baserunning. “And we've won a bunch of them.”
Barger was recalled from triple-A Buffalo earlier this week to cover Nathan Lukes’ paternity leave and remained up when the centre-fielder returned Friday, with Davis Schneider optioned down instead.
He’s now positioned to get some opportunity and he changed the game with his throwing arm in the fourth and fifth innings.
With the Blue Jays up 2-1 in the fourth and Francis battling without a good splitter, Barger first unleashed a 93.6 m.p.h. throw to easily get Cal Raleigh at second as the catcher tried to stretch a single into right-field corner.
Francis then hit the next batter, Randy Arozarena, before Luke Raley doubled to right, which Barger fielded and made a 96 m.p.h. throw into second. That sailed a bit wide and there was no play at the bag, but Bichette alertly saw Arozarena too far around the base at third. His relay home led to a rundown, with Will Wagner making a nice play to pick a low throw from Kirk at third before relaying back to the catcher around the runner in the lane, leading to a tag when Arozarena stumbled.
Barger then helped get Francis out of trouble again in the fifth when with two on and none out, he chased down Ben Williamson's liner to right field and fired a 98.8 m.p.h. laser to get an unwisely tagging Rowdy Tellez by a wide margin at third.
“That saved the night,” said Francis. “That was insane.”
“That was a huge part of the game today,” said George Springer, who had two hits and scored twice in his return to the lineup from a wrist issue.
“He obviously has difference-maker ability and he was a difference-maker today,” said Bichette. “It's awesome to see him out there and making those plays.”
Francis, who allowed nine hard-hit balls during six innings, used the outs on the basepaths to hold the Mariners to only one run on five hits, one a Tellez solo shot in the second, with five strikeouts.
“It makes you feel great, any way I can help the team win, in this case, guys trying to take extra base and taking that away from them was really helpful,” said Barger. “I get excited to throw. I love throwing the baseball. I don't know if it's confidence or just something I love to do, but it's probably my favourite part of the game.”
Offensively he went hitless but had some good swings against Woo, who gave up 14 hard-hit balls but still held the Blue Jays to three runs on seven hits, only one for extra base hits, over seven innings.
That made their situational work all the more essential.
In the first, Bichette singled, stole second, took third on Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s groundout to first and scored on Anthony Santander’s liner to left.
After Alan Roden’s sacrifice fly cashed in Springer to put the Blue Jays up 2-1 in the second, Springer doubled to lead off the fourth, advanced to third on Barger’s liner to left and scored when Kirk shot a grounder up the middle, an example of what the outfielder called “grinder games” needed against elite starters.
“Everybody's kind of bought in that you've got to be selfless in this game and the most important thing at the end of the day is a win or a loss, whether you hit five homers in a game or none,” Springer continued. “This is a tough schedule to start so any way you can find a way to score helps. The selflessness, you're seeing guys if they move somebody over, they're clapping. It's not, oh, shoot, I flew out. It's I got a guy to third base because I have confidence in the guy behind me. Over the span of time, that's going to do a lot of good.”
The Blue Jays intend to count on it, whether or not they get the steadier stream of big-blow offence they’re awaiting.
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