SAN DIEGO – A game that went off-course early ended with more frustration for the Toronto Blue Jays on Saturday.
In between they rallied with a pair of game-changing home runs from Jonatan Clase and Vladimir Guerrero Jr., but the end result was still another loss for the 45-50 Blue Jays, who are now 1.5 games behind the Mariners for the third American League wild-card spot but fourth in the AL East behind the surging Red Sox.
Starter Trey Yesavage was as wild as he’s ever been in the majors, walking the first three hitters he faced, but Padres starter Walker Buehler was equally ineffective, walking four Blue Jays and allowing four early runs to let the visitors back into the game.
The Padres started so poorly that the crowd of 40,561 spent much of the early part of the game booing their team. If this game had been played in Toronto, Blue Jays fans would have had plenty of reason to boo, too.
The boos turned to cheers when the Padres took a 7-4 lead, but Guerrero Jr. tied the game with a three-run homer in the sixth inning, his sixth of the season and second in the last three games.
“That’s a good sign,” said manager John Schneider. “There’s been some encouraging signs with him – encouraging signs with a lot of guys, really – but that’s the kind of thing he can do.”
Unfortunately for the Blue Jays, former teammate Ty France took Mason Fluharty deep in the bottom of the sixth, giving the Padres a one-run lead. In San Diego, that’s often enough as the late-inning duo of Adrian Morejon and Mason Miller kept the Blue Jays from getting back into the game, resulting in an 8-7 Padres win.
A Luis Urias single against Morejon created a little hope in the top of the eighth, but Clase was unable to get a bunt down against the flame-throwing lefty and the potential rally soon fizzled.
One inning later, Nathan Lukes led off with a single against Miller and George Springer crushed a ball to centre for a potential extra-base hit only to see Jackson Merrill run it down. One batter later, Kazuma Okamoto struck out to end the game.
“Their back end is good,” Schneider said. “George hit the crap out of the ball.”
“We had chances and I love the way we battled back It’s tough to stand out there and watch seven walks, then come in and score four, then do it again with a swing from Vlad. There’s been a lot of encouraging things going on offensively, but yeah, you’ve got to take advantage.”
Still, the story of this game revolves around Yesavage. Simply put, the rookie right-hander could not find the zone. Of the 59 pitches he threw, only 20 were strikes. He fell behind on 12 of the 13 hitters he faced, slowing the pace of the game to a crawl while walking Padre after Padre.
“Just never really got a feel for anything,” Schneider said. “Never got into a rhythm.”
Afterwards, Yesavage said his command issues stemmed from a mechanical issue. Specifically, his posture wasn’t right – an issue he worked on in-game with pitching coach Pete Walker.
"Just leaning back too far,” Yesavage said. “It makes everything get out of whack and fly open."
All told, he tied a career high by walking seven hitters and was charged with four earned runs. He allowed just one hit, largely because so few pitches were close enough to tempt the Padres to swing.
This isn’t the first time Yesavage has had trouble staying in the strike zone. In the last six weeks, he’s had starts with five, six and seven walks. Yet the control issues were more pronounced this time, as his previous career low for strikes in a start was 42, more than double what he managed Saturday.
“We’ve been working on stuff the last few weeks,” Yesavage said. “Fine-tuning mechanics and just getting in the zone more. But today it just didn’t happen.”
When the second half begins next weekend, the Blue Jays will be relying on Yesavage to find ways to attack the strike zone far more consistently.
“He’ll have some time over the break to fix it and get back to what he’s good at,” Schneider said. “Confident he’ll make some adjustments going forward and be back on the attack.”
Mind you it’s not just Yesavage who’s not throwing strikes. As a staff, the Blue Jays ranked 30th among the 30 MLB teams in zone percentage entering play Saturday.
Because of the abbreviated outing from Yesavage, the Blue Jays needed to cover 6.1 innings of relief with Adam Macko, Braydon Fisher, Fluharty and Spencer Miles. As a collective, they held their own, allowing a total of three runs to keep the game within reach.
Afterwards, Schneider suggested the likes of Fluharty could have chosen better pitches – specifically that they could have put more faith in catcher Alejandro Kirk instead of shaking him off.
“Going forward you learn from that,” Schneider said. “Those add-on runs make it a little tougher.”
The Petco Park finale Sunday will also be the final game before the All-Star break for the Blue Jays, who will look to win the series with Kevin Gausman on the mound opposite Germán Márquez.
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