It’s more than a little ironic that in Aaron Sanchez’ first start since his place in the rotation (for the time being, that is) was reconfirmed, he lost his first decision since back in April.
It’s more than a little painful that the Royals didn’t so much beat him as nibble him to death like a bunch of little knicker-clad piranhas. Sanchez wasn’t totally dominant this time, as he has been most of the summer, but he was pitching well enough to carry a slim lead through for the win until the Kauffman Stadium presentation of Death by a Thousand Cuts carried him away on a wave of . . . puff balls.
The Jays had to be feeling really good after Friday night’s exciting one-run win over the Royals, keyed by Devon Travis’ game-winning homer in the top of the night, and saved by Joaquin Benoit, his first since last April, in the absence of the overworked Roberto Osuna.
It was their fourth win in five games on the current road trip, and when they had looked ahead to this stretch on their schedule, they must have thought that four games in Houston and three in Kansas City in early August should have been labelled on the calendar, like the maps of yore, with the warning “Here be dragons”. And yet they were going for their fifth win in the sixth game of the trip, riding the crest of the best stretch of all-around, first inning through last inning quality, pitching that this writer can recall in recent times. Who would have thought that the Blue Jays of 2016 could go through a string of five games on the road scoring only 14 runs, a touch less than three–three!–a game and still win four out of five.
On top of everything else, the first start Friday night of the new six-man rotation had proven it to be a functional, if not esthetic, success, as Francisco Liriano contributed a performance similar to what we’ve come to expect from all of the Jays’ starters this year. And with Sanchez now taking the start he would have had Friday night, we would get our first preliminary report on the main question of the six-man scheme, would it benefit Aaron Sanchez?
On the other hand, the Royals were starting Danny Duffy, the left-hander who has provided grist for Toronto’s mill in the past, but this year seems to have sorted himself out and finally found his place in the disrupted Kansas City rotation. With his eventual six and two thirds innings of two-run ball tonight, he extended his record to a healthy eight and one, with an ERA of 2.97. If the Jays were hoping to maintain their string of good pitching, they would still need to pair it with more effective hitting to secure a second win in the series. For the most part they managed the first objective, given the fluky nature of the Royals’ run production, but they failed to provide more than token resistance against Duffy and his successors.
Sanchez started out on a roll equal to his recent run of starts. He faced three over the minimum in the first four innings. He gave up one walk and two singles, and threw only fifty pitches. Duffy, meanwhile, also shut down the Jays through four, though he had to work a little harder. He gave up one run, two hits, and a walk, and threw 64 pitches. Then in the top of the fifth, he gave up a double to Kevin Pillar leading off, then held the Jays until Devon Travis singled Pillar home with two outs. So that made it the Devon Travises 2, the Royals no score going to the bottom of the fifth, with Duffy having given up the two runs on four hits and a walk, while throwing 79 pitches.
What’s that you say? Where did the other run come from? And why is it Devon Travis two and the Royals no score? Oh, I guess I forgot to mention that Travis, leading off the game, hit a home run to left centre field to post the first Toronto run. That’s right. Three solo homers in two games. First inning yesterday, ninth inning yesterday for the win, first inning today. What a guy! But the other Jays’ hitters, not so much, in particular the meat of the order, who for all practical purposes have gone oh for Kansas City.
So Sanchez cruised into the bottom of the fifth with a two-nothing lead and not a worry in the world, except: what was that cloud of gnats doing buzzing into the stadium and settling in the sky right over his head? That he keeps slapping at, apparently to no avail? Oh, not to worry. This is not a post-Apocalyptic story of nasty teeny-tinies taking over the world. No, it was just the potent offence of the Kansas City Royals, finally rousing from slumber.
Alex Gordon opened the inning by hitting a line-drive single to right. The next four hitters all reached safely on base hits. None of them left the infield. Paulo Orlando hit a ground ball to Troy Tulowitzki at short and beat it out. With runners at first and second, enter Raul Adalberto Mondesi, son of former Blue Jay Raul Mondesi, and brother of former minor leaguer Raul Mondesi Jr., bringing to mind the country bumpkin brothers on the old Bob Newhart Show, who were always introduced with, “this is my brother Darrell, and this is my other brother Darrell”.
Now besides having a pretty serious major league pedigree, and coming from a family where there seems to be a certain lack of creativity over first names, this Raul Mondesi is a pretty electric young ballplayer.
So this Raul Mondesi comes up to bunt Gordon and Orlando over to put the tying runs in scoring position with one out. And bunts for a base hit. With the bases loaded, Alcides Escobar, that annoying little rat, hits a sharp grounder to the left of third baseman Josh Donaldson. It glances off Donaldson’s glove and deflects straight to Tulo at short, but of course there’s no throw to first, and Gordon comes in to score. Sanchez then looked good to get out of the inning still with the lead, as Cheslor Cuthbert softly lined out to Travis at second for the first out, and Lorenzo Cain bounced one to a drawn-in Donaldson, who came home for the force-out. Two out, bases loaded, we still lead, two to one, with chief gnat and troublemaker Eric Hosmer coming to the plate. Hosmer finally shows that somebody in the Royals’ lineup can reach the outfield by stroking a single to centre that scores Orlando and Mondesi. Kendrys Morales grounds out to Justin Smoak at first to end the inning on one pitch, but after six hits and 24 pitches, after only fifty in the first four innings, the torture is over and the Royals held a three-two lead after five innings, which Duffy maintained through the top of the sixth despite walking Edwin Encarnacion.
At 74 pitches and only damaged, essentially, by blips and bleeders, there was no reason not to send Sanchez out for the bottom of the sixth, and he quickly got two outs, but then weakened and yielded an insurance run to the Royals. With two outs, Paulo Orlando reached on a base hit, and stole second, whence he scored on a triple to right field, a hard rip into the corner, by the Mondesi who’s not the father, and not the junior. So as Sanchez finished six and turned it over to the bullpen, the Royals had a two-run lead to protect.
Duffy stayed out there for the top of the seventh, and gave up a single to leadoff hitter Kevin Pillar, awarded after a review of the call at first, before striking out Justin Smoak and Melvin Upton. At this point, Manager Ned Yost, not wanting the lefty Duffy to get blasted by Devon Travis, pulled his starter and brought in funky-delivery guy, Peter Moylan. The strategy worked, as Moylan fanned Travis to end the inning.
That’s where it stayed to the end. Danny Barnes made his second appearance for the Blue Jays, picking up Sanchez in the seventh and eighth. He had an interesting time of it, in that he gave up leadoff doubles in both innings, but did not allow either of them to score, showing an admirable level of cool which suggested that there may continue to be a place for him in the Toronto bullpen as the season progresses.
As for the Jays, they went pretty quietly this time. The funkmaster Moylan pitched around a walk to Edwin Encarnacion in the eighth inning, and Kelvin Herrera came in for the save in the ninth. This time there would be no heroics. Ground out, pop up, and a strikeout to end the game at 16 pitches, and Herrera had his fourth save, and the Jays’ record on the road trip slipped to four and two, which is pretty good considering they haven’t even been able to buy a base hit with runners in scoring position in Houston and Kansas City so far.
Marcus Stroman goes against the eccentric Yordano Ventura tomorrow, in the last game of the road trip. Here’s hoping that we turn things around and hit Ventura before he hits us, and that we head for home with no broken bones.
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