After a nearly three-month hiatus from my daily reports on the ups and downs of the Toronto Blue Jays, this day looked like a good one to resume my post. The game itself Monday night was likely to be auspicious, marking the first time that the brothers, crown princes of Cuban baseball, Lourdes Gurriel Junior and Yuli Gurriel, would meet on the field in a major league game.
It also marked the last hurrah atof the noble and self-effacing Marco Estrada, who started what was surely the final homegame of hisbrief but impactful Blue Jays’ career, a career during which he provided Toronto’s fans with far more thrills than anyone ever hoped for when he arrived from Milwaukee at the beginning of2015 with a mediocre record of 23 and 26 in the National League.
Alas, the game itself failed to live up to its billing in respect of both the Gurriel and the Estrada story lines. After Yuli Gurriel knocked in a run for the Astros in the top of the first, Lourdes Junior, typically hustling out a double-play ball, damaged a hamstring in the bottom of the first and was pulled from the game. It appears that his season is at an end.
As an aside, my observation is that if Troy Tulowitzki goes into spring training thinking he’s the incumbent starting shortstop, he’d better be prepared for a surprise; barring further injury, Gurriel seems to have nailed it in his first season in the majors.
Meanwhile Estrada, still hampered by physical problems, though he managed to provide a few moments that recalled the glory days, was only too hittable, right from the first pitch of the game, which George Springer smashed into the gap in right centre for a double.
Estrada lastedfour and two thirds. Hemanaged to limit the damage to four runs on seven hits, leaving with the Jays only down 4-2, thanks to a rousing two-run homer by Kevin Pillar off Dallas Keuchel in the bottom of the fourth, a drive that made up to a limited extent for the back-to-back dingers Estrada hadserved up to Brian McCann and Josh Reddick in the second.
Jays manager John Gibbons pulled Estrada with two on and two out in the fifth, lest he have to face the left-handed McCann again, after McCann’s drive off him in the second.
There’s no doubt in my mind that Gibbie pulled Estrada mid-inning to give the crowd a chance to acknowledge him for the last time as he trudged off the field. A little smile, a little waveof his glove athis thigh—Estrada was never one for big displays—and he was gone into the dugout for the last time as a Blue Jay at the TV Dome.
Marco Estrada should be the centre of his own encomium, but it’s not for me to write it, as Arden Zwelling has already done so much more finely on Sportsnet.ca. You can read it at: https://www.sportsnet.ca/baseball/mlb/estrada-somber-final-game-blue-jay/Of course Arden had to thrown in a couple of his charts, but they detract not a bit from a lovely piece of work.
So, to my title, and the real subject for today: it must be stated unequivocally here and now that henceforward the world of sport cannot consider itself to exist in a bubble, impervious tothe world around it.
When I awoke Monday morning, sportsdom was consumed, not with the anticipation of an inconsequential baseball game in Toronto, but with the electrifying news that Tiger Woods was back!
Revered seniorWashington Post sports columnist Thomas Boswell, who penned the immortal line, “Life begins on Opening Day”, devoted his column yesterday to Woods’ return to the victory podium Sunday afternoon in the Tour Championship in Atlanta, Georgia.
For those who can stomach it, you can read his piece at
But I’ll summarize it for you, get quickly to the point, and save you the trouble. Boswell, who always writes majestically, waxes beautifully about the depths and difficulties into which Tiger Woods fell, and how against all odds he resurrected himself and his career, and finally won the love of the fans who had never warmed to the Tiger of old, as much as they admired his ability.
However, Boswell works very hard to elicit our sympathy for all that Tiger Woods has endured in recent years, while treading very lightly indeed on those aspects of Tiger’s fall which were not only totally of his own making, but shine a very negative light on the essential character flaws of Mr. Woods.
Thomas Boswell, as he often does, reaches Shakespearian heights in his tribute to Tiger Woods. However, in so doing, he has forgotten some elementary Shakespeare. The tragic hero in Shakespeare, we must remember, always carries a fatal flaw within. No more so than the character of Macbeth, who brought down on himself a fate most richly deserved.
But Mr. Boswell would have had us up and cheering for Macbeth if he had gotten off the floor and conquered Macduff to survive. At least, that’s so it seems, considering his treatment of Woods in yesterday’s column.
Not mentioned by Boswell is that Woods’ fall began with an egregious display of domestic infidelity and never explained violence, and was exacerbated by the detailing of his career of entitled priapism (you can look that one up) that unfolded in the following days. Who knew that conquering the world of golf for Tigers Woods was only a convenient tool to be used to lay waste every willing golf groupie he could get his hands on? While living out a superficially perfect family life with his beautiful wife and two young children?
So, no, Mr. Boswell, I prefer not to consider whether this is the “greatest comeback of all time”, let alone compare it to the comeback of Muhamad Ali, whose return, it will be recalled, was from a prison sentence served for refusing on principleto be drafted into the U.S. military to participate in the war in Viet Nam. The gorge rises in the throat at the thought of the comparison of Woods and Ali, not to mentionthe even more invidious comparison between the return of Tiger Woods and the miraculous comeback to the winners’ circle of golf greatBen Hogan after being nearly killed in a car crash.
To be clear, there is no fatal flaw to be found either in Ali or in Ben Hogan, but that’s okay, because Tiger Woods has plenty of fatal flaws to go around.
Mr. Boswell needs to look at his calendar, see that it’s 2018, and look for a redemptive hero more in keeping with the temper of the times.
And then there’s Roberto Osuna. Monday’s game marked Osuna’s return to Toronto, in uniform for the first time since the club placed him on administrative leave last May eighth.
If there was one moment that marked the beginning of the end for the Blue Jays’ 2018 season, it was when we learned that Roberto Osuna had been charged with assault in a domestic violence case, and been placed on leave by the Jays pending an investigation by Major League Baseball. A week into May, their fine April start was pretty well forgotten, and it was all downhill from there.
If anyone on Toronto’s team could have been considered the team’s fair-haired boy, despite his darkly handsome looks, it would havebeenOsuna. Making his major league debut at the age of 20 on April 8, 2015 in Yankee Stadium by striking out Alex Rodriguez in a high leverage situation,he quickly and easily assumed the club’s closer role, despite his callow years.
He performed so admirably as the closer and a huge contributor through the playoff years, and into the darker days of 2017 and early 2018, that at the beginning of this year he became the youngest reliever in major league history to attain 100 saves.
The future was bright for Roberto Osuna, whether he remained with the Blue Jays through their inevitable rebuild to buttress another playoff contender, or whether he would be traded off for a playoff opportunity with another team, in exchange for an appropriately rich treasure trove of prospects.
From the beginning of his relationship with the Blue Jays it was a great story. Plucked from poverty at the age of 16 but already having pitched in the professional Mexican League, he was so prized by the Jays that they nursed him through Tommy John surgery and the recovery therefrom. His time in the majors never left any doubt that Toronto had made a fine if lucky choice in bestowing international cash on his signing.
Then came May 8, 2018, and the end of the career of Roberto Osuna as a Blue Jay.
As an organization, Toronto was presented with a quandary; no decision would be required until MLB finished its investigation, but once Osuna’s 75-game suspension was announced, it became evident that the team did not feel it would be appropriate to bring him back to Toronto after the suspension regardless of what might happen in terms of the criminal charge against Osuna.
In 2018, the team understood that their young star would ever be tainted by the charge against him, and it would be hard to present him as an appropriate representative of a team that is, after all, backed by a corporation, a corporation, one might add, that has never had a great public image in Toronto in any case.
So as Osuna’s suspension came to an end, and the rules allowed him to begin rehab assignments, the Jays were faced with the fact that they had an asset that was worthless to them. But then the question became: would another team, perhaps a playoff-bound team, be less fastidious, more able to hold its nose while making the deal, see enoughvalue in him to offer fair value in return?
In 2015 the Chicago Cubs showed they were willing to overlook the stench emanating from Aroldis Chapman’s vicinity, andtraded prospects to the Yankees to acquire him after he’d served out his domestic violence suspension. The Cubsrode his big left arm to the World Series championship, and then the Yankees, in 2016, showed their eagerness to pretend that Chapman had somehow become a changed man while exiled to the North Side of Chicago, and re-signed him to return in triumph with all forgiven, as long as he continued to pile up the triple-digit strikeouts.And of course the Yanks also harvested the proceeds of the trade, among them current rookie-of-the-year candidate Gleyber Torres, bullpen stalwart Adam Warren, and our very own Billy McKinney.
But this is 2018, and the issue stands even more starkly: what team would dare take on Roberto Osuna, in a bald-faced assertion that winning trumps all? The answer, surprisingly, was the Houston Astros, a team with a well-known club-house adhesion, and with a couple of outspoken #MeToo supporters on the roster.
Regardless, Astros’ management was not only so crass as to disregard the potential public relations and dissension problems created by acquiring Osuna, but in my opinion profoundly careless in assembling the roster of players to be sent to Toronto in exchange for the young closer.
Granted that Ken Giles was on the outs with Astros’ manager A.J. Hinch, and had lost the Houston closer’s job, yet since his arrival he hadgone twelve for twelve in save opportunities for the Blue Jays. (His thirteenth out of thirteenth came Wednesday afternoon against his old team.) David Paulino has already made his debut with the major league team, and has displayed not only an impressively large body, but a beautiful assortment of different curve balls in a few innings of very effective work.
Giles, if he continues his good work next year, will, barring the lightning strike of a surprise Jays’ playoff run, no doubt be harvested next July for another flock of prospects, but the prize of the haul might well be Hector Perez, who achieved the rank of eleventh-best prospect for Toronto by the end of the year, and just might be a serious piece of the pitching mix next time we shoot for the top.
So it was inevitable that the last home series of the year for the Blue Jays, joined by half the roster of the Buffalo Bisons, facing the Astros, would be fraught in many ways, both for the home team and the visitors, not to mention the Toronto fans and the management of both teams.
Despite the fact that Joe Biagini, who is surely running out of chances to secure his future with Toronto, yielded yet another ninth-inninginsurance run in yet another tight game, A.J. Hinch felt the Houston lead of 5-3 precarious enough against the homer-happy Jays to call on his young closer, Roberto Osuna, to make his first appearance at the TV Dome since that fateful night in May.
The question on everyone’s mind was how would he be received, with sympathy or scorn.
The bullpen door opened; Osuna skipped out in his usual style. And the boos rained down.
In fact, they rained down twice. Manager Hinch had belatedly requested a review of the pickoff by Biagini of Jose Altuve at first that had ostensibly ended the top of the ninth. Osuna returned to the bullpen for a few more throws while waiting, and the typical exchange of players on the field slowed to a halt, the Astros half on and the Jays half off.
Then Altuve was confirmed to have been picked off, and Osuna had to enter again, inspiring a new chorus of boos.
The boos continued, with greater or lesser intensity, throughout the bottom of the ninth as Osuna picked up the save while giving up a base hit to Richard Urena, and continued as the game came to an end.
It wasn’t everyone booing, mind you, but it was fairly general, and, to me quite surprising, that there was little forgiveness in the hearts of Toronto’s fans for their favoured son who had given away the family jewels in a moment of sublimely misdirected anger.
(I know all that business about innocent/guilty. In fact, with hindsight I am writing this after the charges were dismissed, only because his presumed partner refused to testify against him. But anybody who thinks that nothing bad happened that night between the couple, with him twice her size, is dreaming in technicolour. Or thinks it’s all right even if something did happen. For anyone who thinks the latter, there is nothing to be said. Nothing.)
So, there you have it. The long-anticipated matchup of the elder and the younger Gurriels is truncated by an unfortunate injury. Marco Estrada leaves as he came, and as he worked, with dignity intact and the respect of the faithful, but quietly, without a splash, as he would have wanted.
These should have been the good and leading stories of Monday. But, they weren’t.
Thanks to the lionizing of the permanently tainted Tiger Woods, and the crass decision by the Houston Astros to offer Roberto Osuna a job (but thanks for the exchange, guys!) and bring him back to the scene of his downfall, the Gurriels’ story and the noble Estrada’s departure went by the boards.
Yet again we find ourselves split down the middle, between those who recognize that it’s 2018, and those who don’t, and never will. Or don’t even care.
Note: I’m posting this piece on Friday night, September twenty-eighth, after the drama, and the farce, of the Brett Kavanagh/Dr. Christine Blasey Ford hearing in the U.S. Senate. Also after the well-considered effort of Senator Jeff Flake to care more about seeking the truth than stacking the Supreme Court, which of course came after the heroic intervention of thetwo young elevator ladies who made Jeff Lake think.
I don’t think I need to point out the irony of the timing.
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