Long Ball Stories

Where to start about today’s game? I’m torn between:

One: Maybe we should start listening to Papa John Gibbons when he drawls, “No, I’m not worried about [Bautista/Tulo/Martin/whoever]. He’s a pro. We know what he can do. He’ll come around.”

And two: It’s well past time to recognize how much the “lunch bucket” guys, Pillar, Carrera, Goins, Barney, now Maile and maybe Travis, but especially Kevin Pillar and Zeke Carrera at the top of the order, have done to change the culture of the Toronto Blue Jays in the wake of all the injuries to the “go big or go home” contingent in the team’s makeup.

Obviously, either approach would provide an appropriate entrée for addressing the Jays’ fourth straight win this afternoon, a tight but satisfying affair that ended up with the same score as Thursday night’s series opener, 7-2 for the good guys.

Let’s start with Jose Bautista, since he was the one who iced the game. How natural it seemed that it unfolded as it did. Kevin and Zeke—they’ll get their due anon—had manufactured a run for Toronto in the third. Marcus Stroman’s flair for the dramatic, that is, multiple baserunners followed by multiple strikeouts, protected that run until the fifth, when an maddeningly scratchy run by the Mariners tied the game.

Then the sixth saw the Ms take the lead in more traditional fashion with three solid singles, putting Stroman on the hook for the loss until Kendrys Morales, newly returned to the lineup after a few days on the shelf, took him right back off the hook with a rousing blast to right, putting the game in the hands of the Toronto bullpen.

Seattle’s bullpen, sadly, had been in play since Ryan Weber, to all appearances a fine young pitcher, became the next in a long line of Seattle starters to develop arm trouble, and had to pull himself from the fray after three and two thirds innings.

So the seventh inning dawned with that exquisite Toronto tension in play: would the bullpen continue to dazzle? Would the lineup manage to come up with a run or two to put the game away?

Of course, back in the heady days of the Blue Jays Bombers, circa pre-September last year, we didn’t worry about such things, did we? At least one decisive blast off the other guy’s relievers was just a given; you never had to worry about the runs, just the bullpen.

Now it’s almost exactly the reverse: can we scratch out a run while the bullpen stays strong?

So the dance of the end game started. Today, it wasn’t as easy for the Jays’ relievers as it has been. It took the combined efforts of Jason Grilli, Aaron Loup, and Dominic Leone to suppress a dangerous Seattle threat in the seventh, in most dramatic fashion, and keep the game even.

Boy, did this inning have moments. Grilli started with a bit of bad luck. No, I’m not talking about the fact that he had to face Jean Segura, but what happened when he did. Segura topped a teasing little hopper down the third base line. Darwin Barney would have been lucky to get Segura with a perfect play, but he lost the handle, and Segura was across with an infield hit.

Then came one of those dramatic moments that don’t appear in the box score, and seldom make the game reports. Ben Gamel lashed one deep to centre that stayed in the park, allowing Kevin Pillar to draw a bead on it. Now, I haven’t mentioned this, but besides all of his other talents, Segura is plenty quick. He tagged up on the ball, and broke for second with the catch. But then he stopped to admire the Pillar weapon that’s seldom mentioned, his sterling arm. From the deepest confines of the park, Pillar threw a bomb, all the way in the air, that Ryan Goins caught at his knees while standing on the bag at second.

Then Nelson Cruz fought off a pitch and barely muscled an opposite-field single to right, with Segura stopping at second. Considering the damage Cruz could have done, this wasn’t a bad outcome, but it brought John Gibbons out to bring Aaron Loup in to match up against Kyle Seager. Loup got Seager all right, fanning him for the second out, but there was the little matter of the wild pitch he threw during the at-bat that let the runners move up. Then it was Dominic Leone’s turn to face Danny Valencia, who, remember, was let go by the Jays in the middle of 2015 in favour of keeping Chris Colabello, and just might have been feeling a bit of extra motivation. It only took Leone two pitches in induce an easy grounder to third from the still-dangerous Valencia, to end the inning. Keep that number, two pitches from Leone, in mind, okay?

Wait a minute, you might say, aren’t you taking a long time to get around to Jose Bautista. Fair enough, but his moment is right around the corner.

After Grilli, Loup, and Leone did their thing in the top of the seventh, Scott Servais brought in Nick Vincent, who has been one of his rocks in the bullpen, to keep the game level.

But with one out Pillar singled to centre for his third hit of the game. Zeke Carrera then hit a grounder off Segura’s glove for an infield single. This brought Bautista to the plate for the key at-bat of the game. But wait: isn’t there supposed to be a different thread here about the “lunch-bucket guys”? That’s okay, in the seventh the two story lines converged as Pillar and Carrera were the ones who got to ride home on the strength of Bautista’s blast to centre that broke the game open.

Zych got the last two outs in the seventh, but it was a bit late, eh? So as of seven, that set up to Tony Zych to take the loss, and let’s see, who was it? That’s right, it was Dominic Leone, remember him? Two pitches to end the Seattle sixth, and now he was in line for the win. No wonder they sometimes refer to middle relievers as “garbage men” for picking up a win here and there like vultures with tasty road kill.

With the three-run lead, John Gibbons reverted to his close-out protocol and brought in Joe Smith, who escaped damage in the eighth despite giving up a single and a walk. In fact, he left only one man on base, because Luke Maile, lunch-bucket guy, combined with Ryan Goins, lunch-bucket guy, on a great throw-down and tag out of Guillermo Heredia trying to steal second after he singled off Smith.

Then the lunch-bucket guys manufactured a couple of neat add-on runs in the bottom of the eighth, but this wasn’t their first contribution to the afternoon’s festivities, so let’s go back a bit and see what else the guys from the poorer part of town did to make their mark on this game.

Ryan Weber had started the game by retiring eight of the first nine batters he faced, having given up only a double to that other guy, Bautista, in the first. But there were a number of hard hit balls that made you wonder about when something was going to start shaking down for Toronto.

The eight out of first nine retired naturally brought Kevin Pillar back to the plate with two down and nobody on in the third. We’re starting to have a thing here with Pillar, and I’m going to start watching it, and that’s how often he seems to get something going that pays off when he comes up with two down and nobody on.

So this time he chipped in the Jays’ second hit when he ripped a line single over the outstretched glove of the leaping Taylor Motter at second. With Zeke Carrera at the plate and not much to lose, Pillar took off and swiped second. Like they do, Zeke’s eyes lit up a bit when he saw the duck out there on the pond, and he whacked a grounder to Motter’s glove side that just got under the shaggy second baseman’s dive, bounced into right, and brought Pillar home with the first run of the game. Poor Motter: over his glove, under his glove, he didn’t know what might come next.

Lunch bucket guy (let’s call them the LB Boys, okay?) Ryan Goins did a fundamental baseball thing in the fourth inning that gave Toronto another scoring chance, even though it didn’t pay off. What was that fundamental? Put the flippin’ ball in play! Two outs and nobody on again, and the Mariners into a shift for Goins that put Danny Valencia on the outfield grass down the first base line, Goins hit a hard grounder down the line. It didn’t have double written all over it, and it was the kind of ball that Justin Smoak gobbles up, but Valencia mis-timed a hop, maybe off a seam, and butchered it; Goins ended up on second. The only reason he died there was because LB Boy Darwin Barney, who was making Jarrod Dyson run all over the place in centre field all day with nothing to show for it, drove him into right centre where he made a (nother) nice running catch to end the inning.

In the fifth it was LB Boy Pillar who doubled over Gamel’s head in right (going the other way) with two outs and nobody on (again), but he died there when LB Boy Carrera flew out to (where else?) Dyson in centre.

In the sixth, with one out, after Morales’ home run had re-tied the game, Justin Smoak finally got away with pulling a hard grounder into the shift. All he had to do was hit it so hard that it went off the glove of Segura, shifted into short right, for a single. This brought LB Boy Goins to the plate for one of the cheekiest moments of the game. I don’t know whether it came from the bench or not, but didn’t they put on a hit-and-run, with dump truck Smoaky at first!

Time for some baseball 101 here: Let’s keep in mind here that the hit and run is more properly the run and hit, and is intended to get a guy from first to third on a base hit, with the secondary accomplishment of staying out of the double play. With a hitter at the plate who has a sharp eye and good bat control (good luck finding one of those around these days!) a runner who might not otherwise be a threat to steal breaks for second with the pitch, triggering the middle infielders to have to cover the bag. Generally, and they arrange this before every batter, if not every pitch, it would be the opposite field guy to the hitter, so if it’s a lefty at the plate, the shortstop covers. The hitter, seeing the shortstop breaking for the bag, slaps the ball toward where the shortstop was, but now isn’t. The runner, with a full head of steam, makes it to third and the hitter’s got a base knock to boot. When it works, it’s a thing of beauty.

So when reliever Tony Zych committed to the plate, Smoak took off, Jean Segura broke for the bag to take a throw, and Goins bounced one right past the spot where Segura had been stationed before he broke for the bag. In this case, Smoak had to stop at second because, well, he’s Justin Smoak, and also because the hit-and-run doesn’t work quite as well when there’s a lefty at the plate and the hit is to left, because the left fielder is so much closer to third base. But the secondary goal was met: if Smoak hadn’t gone with the pitch, it was a dead cinch double-play ball to Segura. Associate LB Boy (not sure if he qualifies yet, but he’s working on it) Travis ended the threat by popping out to Motter at second, but still, it was a moment.

Then in the seventh, as we’ve seen, LB Boys, Pillar and Carrera set the table for Bautista’s game-winning home run.

So now we come to the bottom of the eighth that I mentioned before, after LB Boys Maile and Goins had teamed up to gun down Heredia’s attempted steal in the top of the eighth.

So by now we’ve Jose’s second consecutive decisive blast, after Friday night’s two-run shot, and we’ve got a three-run lead, and the bullpen’s been golden so far. It’s still nice to tack on a couple of extras though, even if only to take a little pressure off your closer.

The big lefty James Pazos, who brings plenty of heat, got the call from Scott Servais to pitch the eighth. (Wish the announcers would pronounce his name right—they keep calling him Scott “Service”. ‘Course, that’s probably how he pronounces it. Americans. Sheesh.) Maybe Servais went with a lefty because LB Boy Ryan Goins was leading off.

Wow, is this a trend?

Anyway, Goins did it again and lifted one softly over the left side of the infield for a single. After LB Boy Barney fanned, aspiring LB Boy Devon Travis bounced a slow one towards second, where Taylor Motter was ready to gift the Blue Jays with an extra out. It was on his glove side, and he went in and picked it, and really only had the play at first. But he looked at second because Goins had to stop to let the ball go by, and made a late decision to try for a force on Goins. In his haste to turn and throw, his feet slipped out from under him and he embarrassingly spiked the throw into the ground. Everybody safe on the error and no place to hide for Mr. Motter.

With LB Boy Maile at the plate, Pazos, his back to third as a lefty, had a mental lapse and didn’t check Goins who easily stole third. Maybe rattled, he hit Maile on a hand with a pitch to load the bases. Long pause while we all thought, OMG, another injury, Mike Ohlman’s the starting catcher! But Maile shrugged it off and took his base.

With the lineup turned over that brought up LB Boy Pillar, who hit a sac fly to left that not only scored Goins but allowed Travis to move up to third, setting up what came next.

Would you believe a delayed double steal, with Zeke Carrera at the plate? Maile, of all people, broke for second when Pazos went to the plate. Travis broke down a bit from third and stopped. Catcher Carlos Ruiz stepped out, fired to second, and Travis broke for the plate. Motter, covering second and with his team down four runs, correctly ignored the easy out on the incoming Maile, and fired back to Ruiz. Unfortunately for him his throw took Ruiz a bit up the first-base line, and Travis slid across safely with no review even considered. My kids used to do that all the time in Peewee, but you don’t see it too often in the big leagues any more.

Okay, after that display we have to add Devon Travis to the LB Brigade, full patch member!

John Gibbons had both Roberto Osuna and the new guy Leonel Campos warming up for the ninth, but when they picked up the extra two runs, Campos got the call, with Osuna standing by.

Of course Jean Segura was leading off, and of course he shot a double into the left field corner. Campos, who was unable to match Thursday night’s performance, walked Ben Gamel on four pitches. In fact, the only strike he threw was the one Segura hit, which was on a 1-0 count. So, best laid plans and not taking any chances, Campos was out and Osuna in after all, probably because he was already hot, and also because he was maybe a little better rested than anybody else left in the ‘pen.

Well, that was the ticket. Osuna produced the final three outs on six pitches without letting in a run. Nelson Cruz hit into a highlight-reel double play featuring LB Boy Travis and LB Boy Goins, and a great scoop by Bomber (i.e., not LB Boy) Smoak at first. Travis picked it, fed a nice underhand flip to Goins who did an Ozzie Smith leap over the sliding Gamel and unloaded a low throw to first that Smoak scooped with panache. Kyle Seager, who was almost totally neutralized in this series, lifted a fly ball to centre on an 0-2 pitch, and this one was in the can. Easy-peasy.

So, we take three straight from the Angels, win our fourth in a row, and climb to within five games of five hundred, through a happy threesome of six good innings from Stroman plus two good innings from the bullpen, a big bash from a resurgent Jose Bautista, and lots of great old-timey style baseball from our very own Lunch Bucket Boys.

This is getting fun!

And Aaron Sanchez returns to the hill tomorrow on Mother’s Day. Yay!