Backed by a three-homer outburst and the opportunistic exploitation of a terrible Chicago collision in the field, Marco Estrada appeared to have completed the job of righting himself tonight with seven brilliant innings of one-run, four-hit pitching.
After the dramatic finish of Sunday’s finale against the Angels in Toronto, an efficient shutdown of the struggling White Sox in Chicago Monday night was just what the doctor ordered for the Toronto Blue Jays.
Until a rare but nasty bug, the late-inning bullpen collapse, laid our heroes low again for the second time in the last three games.
Josh Donaldson hit a two-out solo homer in the top of the first off veteran right-hander James Shields to stake Estrada to a 1-0 lead, and then made a nifty play on leadoff batter Leury Garcia’s slow roller to give Estrada a further boost in the bottom of the inning. The next two Sox flied out, and Estrada was through one on only six pitches.
The game rolled along quickly until the top of the fourth. Shields had settled in after the Donaldson shot and retired seven in a row, and Estrada had faced only one over the minimum, a Matt Davidson walk in the second inning. After three, Shields, who usually labours, had thrown only 38 pitches, and Estrada had gotten by on an amazing 31.
In the top of the fourth, though, Shields’ twin weaknesses, a tendency for wild streaks and a vulnerability to the long ball, cost him two additional Toronto runs, on solo homers by Russell Martin and Justin Smoak, and a long inning in which he also gave up a single to Kendrys Morales, walked two to load the bases, and nearly doubled his pitch count to 70 before escaping without further damage.
In the Chicago fourth Estrada allowed his second-base runner. He was awarded a tough error when he failed to come up cleanly with a hard comebacker by Jose Abreu, but he popped up Davidson to Smoak in foul territory, and fanned prized Chicago rookie Yoan Moncada to end the inning.
After Shields had a more settled fifth inning, Estrada finally gave up his first hit, two in fact, to Tim Anderson and Willy Garcia, but retired the side without further damage to preserve his shutout, finishing it off by fanning the free-swinging Leury Garcia.
The top of the sixth was Shields’ last inning; he struck out the side but there was no joy in the achievement. By the time he finished it off by fanning Jose Bautista, the Jays’ lead had been doubled to six and Chicago had lost both right fielder Willy Garcia and the rookie Moncada to injury in a horrific collision that happened when both tried to track down a blooper into short right centre by Darwin Barney with the bases loaded. The fact that when the ball rolled out of Garcia’s glove without being transferred it was ruled no catch, and all three runners crossed the plate, was of little significance compared to the concern over Garcia, whose head came into significant contact with Moncada’s knee, and Moncada, whose knee was obviously injured. Both had to be removed from the game. Alan Hanson and Yolmer Sanchez came in to replace them in right field and at second base respectively.
After Brad Goldberg, who replaced Shields on the mound, retired Toronto in the top of the seventh with the help of a double play that erased Donaldson’s one-out single, the two replacements for the injured Sox players teamed up to produce Chicago’s first and only run off Estrada. Sanchez led off with an infield single, moved up to second on Kevan Smith’s base hit, advanced to third on a fly ball to right by Tim Anderson, and scored on a sacrifice fly by Hanson. Estrada finished seven innings giving up one run on four hits. It was only the second time since the end of May that he had gone more than five-plus innings, and the first time since that June twenty-fourth outing that he had looked like the Marco Estrada of old.
Goldberg stayed on for the Toronto eighth and got another double play to erase a walk to Steve Pearce to close out a quick second inning of work.
With a five-run lead, it was a good time to save some wear and tear on the arm of Ryan Tepera, so manager John Gibbons brought in Joe Biagini to hold off the Sox in the bottom of the eighth. Biagini had trouble finding the plate, issuing a leadoff walk to Leury Garcia, who promptly stole second. With the arms waiting behind Biagini in the bullpen, and that big five-run lead, there was no reason to be concerned about a runner at second, especially after Tyler Saladino flew out to right for the first out, and Garcia failed to tag and advance to third.
Even when Jose Abreu doubled Garcia home with the second run it was no big deal. Ah, but when Matt Davidson teed off on Biagini to right to make it 6-4, the unease was starting to creep, er, trot, in. Overworked or not, it was time to bring in Tepera, because we were now in setup man mode.
Tepera ended the inning with two comebackers to the mound, but unfortunately the first batter he faced, the accidental second baseman Sanchez, put all of his relatively small self into a high inside 0-2 cutter from Tepera and sent it sailing over the fence in right to cut the lead to 6-5.
Chris Beck made quick work of the Jays in the top of the ninth, clearing the way for Roberto Osuna to take the hill, with the save opportunity definitely on after the Chicago eighth.
Osuna got Hanson on a hard grounder to Justin Smoak at first. One out. Adam Engel hit a short chopper to Donaldson at third and beat it out. The call stood after a rather hopeless Jays’ challenge. Next up was the free-swinging Leury Garcia, who was ruled to have been nicked by an Osuna slider. Again, the play was reviewed, and again the call was upheld. The tying run was now on second. Osuna fanned Tyler Saladino for the second out, bringing Jose Abreu, the only really fearsome Sox hitter left in the lineup after the Great Chicago Fire Sale, to the plate.
Abreu hit a not-so-fearsome blooper into right centre that scored Engel with the tying run, brought Garcia around to third, and brought Davidson, who had homered in the eighth, back to the plate. Osuna went to 2-2 on Davidson before the Chicago hitter lined one solidly into centre to bring the game to a painful end for Toronto.
After being so good for so much of the season, even making the All-Star team, it’s hard to fathom that Roberto Osuna would blow two saves, lose two games, in three days. But, painful as it might be for these struggling Blue Jays, there it is.
Tomorrow has to be a better day.
Or should we, maybe like General Manager Ross Atkins, who dispatched Francisco Liriano to Houston and Joe Smith to Cleveland today at the trade deadline, be thinking next year, since there’s really no longer a tomorrow for us in 2017?
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