it was one of those “Oh no!” moments. On an 0-1 pitch, with one easy swing and a crisp crack, Giancarlo Stanton announced his arrival in the American League East this afternoon. From his extreme closed stance, he stabbed his front foot awkwardly to reach the outside pitch, flicked his bat, and hit a rocket over the bullpen and into the stands. To the opposite field. With an exit velocity of over 117 mph.
Later, much later it seemed, it was a little hard to crank up enthusiasm for Kevin Pillar’s first pitch belt into the left field seats in today’s Toronto opener against the Yankees at the TV Dome. Pillar’s was an impressive shot leading off the eighth, but frankly, this game was decided after just three Yankee hitters in the top of the first.
Pillar’s solo home run was the epitome of too little, too late for an anemic Toronto offence that could muster only two hits while striking out 12 times against an array of effective New York arms.
How swiftly Toronto’s Opening Day starter Jay Happ found himself in a hole. With right fielder and last year’s rookie king Aaron Judge hitting second and Stanton, Miami Marlins’ GM Derek Jeter’s gold-plated gift to the Yankees, hitting third, it’s essential to retire Brett Gardner, their veteran leadoff hitter, before they come to the plate.
So when Curtis Granderson, playing his first game in left field for Toronto in the TV Dome, lost Gardner’s knuckleball liner in the lights and muffed it for an error, it gave you a really bad feeling. Opening Day starter Jay Happ fanned Judge but couldn’t get by Stanton, who crushed it to right centre to plate one earned and one unearned run for New York, giving them a 2-0 lead that they never relinquished.
Or, rather, a lead the Blue Jays never gave the slightest hint of being able to challenge.
On paper, the matchup looked pretty good for Toronto. Happ, who had a solid spring, had never lost a decision to New York. Conversely, Yankee starter Luis Severino had never notched a W against Toronto.
But while Happ was merely good, as long as he stayed in, Severino was way better, though he needed a visit from pitching coach Larry Rothschild after losing his feel and walking two with two out in the first inning.
After Rothschild’s visit Severino fanned Kendrys Morales with a wicked slider, and went on to retire all but two of the following 16 batters he faced, before giving it up for reliever Chad Green with two outs in the sixth after 91 pitches, an impressive chunk of work for a first start.
Only Granderson, with a one-out line single to centre in the fourth, and Josh Donaldson, who walked in the sixth, reached base on the Yankee hurler after the first inning. Granderson’s hit was Toronto’s only safety besides Pillar’s dinger in the eighth, and besides Pillar only three Blue Jays made it to second base in the game.
In a different kind of game, Happ might have hung on for five innings, and even come away with a win with a bit of offensive support, but there was none to be had. The big lefty’s control wasn’t as sharp as he would have liked it, which contributed to a premature rise in his pitch count. When he took his seat after two outs in the fifth inning, he had logged 96 pitches, only 58 of them strikes.
But really, only two of them hurt. The one Stanton crushed in the first inning, and the one that gave Judge a free pass with two outs in the fifth, which was also his last pitch. First in from the bullpen for Toronto was the big Canadian retread John Axford, who earned his way into the Toronto ‘pen with a sterling spring record.
This wasn’t Axford’s day to shine, though. Happ left him to face Stanton, who promptly smashed a double to centre scoring Judge, the second run charged to Happ. Axford then gave up an almost identical double to catcher Gary Sanchez to score Stanton, this run Axford’s responsibility. Axford finally showed some of the flash that won him a job by freezing Aaron Hicks with a 96mph fast ball to end the inning, but the New York lead had doubled to 4-0, and with Severino about to turn things over to the toughest bullpen in baseball, that was more than enough for the win.
Chad Green finished the sixth for Severino and pitched a perfect seventh, striking out three of the four batters he faced. Dellin Betances came in for the eighth inning and promptly gave up the dinger to Pillar, the only hitter to reach base against the Yankee relievers, before keeping the ball in the infield to retire the next three Jays’ hitters. In the ninth, Aroldis Chapman, after giving up a line shot by Justin Smoak to Judge in right, fanned Steve Pearce hitting for Granderson, and Kendrys Morales to walk it off in the non-save situation.
As for the Toronto relievers, Aaron Loup erased a walk to Didi Gregorius leading off the sixth with a double-play ball to Brandon Drury, which rendered Neil Walker’s following ground-rule double to left meaningless when Loup got Tyler Austin to ground out to Josh Donaldson at third on a close play at first that was upheld after an appeal by neophyte Yankee manager Aaron Boone.
Before revisiting the Austin grounder off Loup handled by Donaldson, let’s round off the Jays’ relief efforts. After Loup survived the sixth inning, Danny Barnes promptly gave up a leadoff home run to Brett Gardner in the seventh. This is a bit concerning regarding Barnes, who gave up four homers in the spring in only 8.2 innings of work. I think I heard the radio call on all four of them, so it was starting to sound like a thing.
On the other hand, it was nice vindication for Gardner, who, after reaching on the error in the first, had hit two hard line drives right at Smoak and come up empty both times.
Seung Hwan Oh, the late free agent signing, formerly withthe Cardinals, took the ball for the eighth inning, and kept the Yankees off the board in spite of his own fielding adventures. Perhaps showing his lack of participation in the tedious Pitchers’ Fielding Practice drills that dominate the early days of spring training for pitchers, Oh allowed two base runners; both were his fault.
Oh failed to get off the mound quickly enough on Aaron Hicks’ leadoff grounder to Smoak, and Hicks was on with an infield hit. (To be fair to Oh, Hicks can fly, and it’s problematic whether a quicker reaction would have been enough anyway.)
Then, after he barely managed to keep Gregorius in the park on a deep fly to right, he fanned Drury with a wicked slider. This brought Neil Walker to the plate, and another test of Oh’s rusty fielding. Walker hit an easy little hopper back to Oh that should have ended the inning, but Oh carelessly tried to barehand it and bobbled the ball, letting Walker reach on the error. Then Oh got Tyler Wade to hit another one on the ground, but fortunately it was to Devon Travis, not him, and Oh was out of the inning without any damage other than to his pride.
Now let’s talk about the elephant in the room. Josh Donaldson was largely a non-presence in spring training. He only took 27 at-bats, garnering four singles. He seldom played in the field. There was reassuring talk about how he liked to prepare for the season in his own way, and didn’t value exhibition games. He didn’t join the team in Montreal because, well, two extra games on artificial turf, you know.
So the lineup is posted today and all’s well with the world. There he is, hitting second and playing third base. Nothing suspicious here folks, just move on.
Except. Except that he handled the ball four times at third in this game. Here’s what happened each time.
In the first, after Stanton’s blast, Gary Sanchez bounced one hard to his left. Donaldson made his signature sliding stop, twisted his upper body around to the right, and fired to first from his knees. But the ball fizzled off his hand in a low trajectory, took a true bounce off the turf, and slowly descended into Smoaky’s outstretched trapper, barely nipping Sanchez, who ain’t no Aaron Hicks running to first.
In the fourth, Hicks, who certainly is an Aaron Hicks home to first, smashed one back to the box. It deflected off Happ toward Donaldson, who made an even weaker throw to first than the first one. Didn’t matter, of course, because it was Hicks going down the line, but still.
In the fifth Tyler Austin hit an ordinary grounder to third, and Donaldson threw him out, very gingerly. This time it made it to first on the fly, but oh so softly.
Then the really telling play came in the sixth, on the play that the Yankees appealed at first, but lost. The game was still theoretically within reach at 4-0. (I figure, after Steve Pearce’s grand-slam heroics last year, that a four-run lead is always vulnerable.) Loup was on the mound with two outs and Walker at second after the ground-rule double.
Austin again hit a grounder to third, this time an easy hopper to Donaldson’s left. He glided over, gloved it, then took not one, not two or even three, but four crow hops toward first while he readied his throw. And then tossed another softie, this time on a bounce way up the line toward right. Were it not for Smoak’s heroic stretch to barely glove the ball, it would have bounced away down into the right-field corner.
In truth, the throw pulled Smoak off the bag, and the replays suggested the Yanks should have won the appeal, which would have counted Walker’s run as number five.
But also in truth, it didn’t matter, because on this day the Jays couldn’t hit for stink.
But what does matter is this: apparently, Donaldson can swing the bat fine, so he could DH while his arm revives from being “dead”. And where are we then? Two designated hitters who can’t play in the field. Yangervis Solarte at third, Aledmys Diaz at short, Troy Tulowitzki on the 60-day disabled list, and only the very sweet but very green Gift Ngoepe on reserve between a barely adequate left side of the infield, and absolute disaster.
By the way, Ryan Goins made the Royals’ opening day roster. Just sayin’.
Okay, so he didn’t start and KC got hammered by the ChiSox, but still . . .
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