NEW YORK — A way to navigate the New York Yankees lineup with the arms available to Toronto Blue Jays manager John Schneider in the finale of a four-game set in the Bronx appeared relatively straightforward.
Open with righty Braydon Fisher and get him through Paul Goldschmidt, a span of five batters. Follow with Adam Macko for fellow lefty Spencer Jones on down and let him handle Ben Rice when the top of the order comes back around. Begin Spencer Miles’ bulk innings at Aaron Judge’s second time up and let him rip for some 60-65 pitches, however deep that lands. Ideally that’s into the seventh, where Tyler Rogers and Jeff Hoffman can carry the game past the finish line.
With no Mason Fluharty and Louis Varland after both pitched on consecutive days, that’s a pretty logical deployment plan, at least on paper.
In practice, making it work largely depended on Miles, who not only got the Blue Jays to the seventh, but pitched them through the frame, too, with new career highs of 4.1 innings and 63 pitches, leading the way in a 2-0 win Thursday night.
Making plans is easy. Executing them “pretty much down to the hitter,” according to Schneider, is much tougher.
“You talk through so many things before the game, very rarely does it become exactly what you talked about,” he continued. "They were tremendous. Fish. Macko. I can't say enough about Spencer. He made some big pitches. ... He held his stuff. So, you just look at that in real time, and, yeah, it was pretty cool to watch it unfold.”
Miles allowed only two hits and a walk with six strikeouts in his second bulk outing since the club’s parting with lefty Eric Lauer, continuing his impressive emergence from Rule 5 dice-roll to reliable contributor.
Forced improvisation has thrust him into an increasingly larger role, and the contrast between his work in a three-inning opener stint May 10 versus the Los Angeles Angels and Lauer’s outing that followed set the stage for his current progression.
He threw 3.2 shutout innings of bulk in Detroit last weekend and followed that up with an even better outing as the Blue Jays (23-27) secured a series split after dropping the first two games in New York.
Their trickiest contest of the series turned out to be their finest, as they led start to finish in the only game not decided by one run.
A quasi-bullpen day “is a big ask, especially against a good team,” said Hoffman, dominant in leverage for the second straight night. “Everybody's got to be on their A game because you have no idea what it's going to look like. You don't know that Spencer's going to go out there and shove the majority of the game. A lot of times, it doesn't work out that way. It was really cool to see him do that and he's looked great doing the build-up type of deal. He's got the stuff and the arsenal to do it, and I'm looking forward to him getting more opportunities.”
Offence was again hard to come by, but a Vladimir Guerrero Jr. walk and stolen base off Carlos Rodon in the first set up Daulton Varsho’s RBI double that the pitchers made hold up while George Springer’s solo shot in the seventh added a little margin for error.
Still, everyone needed to be nails and they were, Fisher and Macko each going 1.1 innings ahead of Miles, while Rogers in the eighth and Hoffman in the ninth, for his fourth save, closed the game out.
Kevin Gausman starts Friday’s series opener against Bubba Chandler and the visiting Pittsburgh Pirates and the Blue Jays will need some innings from the right-hander to help the bullpen reset.
“I've got to give a lot of credit to Spence for being pretty flexible and pretty agile," said Schneider. "With a game like (Thursday), you've got Kev (Friday), you could be a little bit more aggressive or creative, but it's really helped that Spence is not shying away from what he's good at. It's really helped that he's giving us some innings and not really over-exposing the bullpen. So it just keeps everything moving, especially for the next game, but for the next turn through, too.”
That next turn through will include another bulk outing for Miles, who broke camp with the club as the last man in the bullpen and has earned more and more responsibility. That he’s serving as a bridge in the rotation until one of Max Scherzer, who threw a short bullpen Thursday, or Shane Bieber is ready, or an external add is made, is due to the Blue Jays not having any alternatives.
Not only is Miles a Rule 5 pick, but he’s also missed almost the entirety of the past three years recovering from back and elbow surgeries, and hadn’t thrown a pitch above A-ball before this season. To contextualize what he’s doing right now, rather than looking to a case study on similar pitchers to guide his path forward, he’s writing the case study for others to follow.
“It's a weird case, a unique case because of his very limited background and innings,” said Schneider.
But gifted with a sinker that’s sitting 96.5 m.p.h., a curveball that was missed on six of 11 swings against the Yankees, and a slider he picked up in spring training, along with a durable frame and repeatable delivery, the pieces are there to dream on a starter.
Toss in his aptitude – as demonstrated by how he dealt with fatigue in the later innings against the Yankees – and that’s a good recipe for success.
“I was playing catch right next to Dylan Cease the other day and something that he does so well is he sits so well (in his legs), he doesn't drift too much and then glides after that,” said Miles. “So tonight, especially in the wind-up, I was focused on sitting and using my legs because if you're throwing with 80 per cent arm, you are going to get fatigued quick. Those are the small muscles. You want the arm to be along for the ride. And I think just using my legs and keep learning about myself, especially 50, 60 pitches and on, you learn about yourself and your tendencies and what you need to get back to.
How much further he can go is an open question, as the lack of workload volume in recent years is something the Blue Jays are conscious of. They’re confident he can handle what’s being asked of him until reinforcements arrive, which would allow his workload to be decreased at that point.
Here and now, “we're building up slowly to get to hopefully no ceiling, but just raising the floor right now and trusting that I can go three, four, five innings,” said Miles. “Just giving them the team that, emptying the tank every inning, giving them whatever I can.”
He did just that to carry the Blue Jays through a difficult path to a win, a series split and another turn of a depleted rotation.
2:14
