After seeing the bullpen blow two of their last three games, it’s now clear that all of the typical markers of a Toronto win—a solid performance by their top pitcher and home runs by both of their most consistent sluggers—don’t necessarily guarantee chalking it up in the “W” column.
But tonight, for once, it did.
It was a typical performance for Marcus Stroman, bendy but not breaky, shutting down the Chisox at crucial points, getting in a jawing match, this time with Chicago shortstop Tim Anderson instead of an umpire, and holding on long enough, seven innings, to give some of the bullpen arms a break.
Likewise it was typical for Josh Donaldson, who homered in the first off Mike Pelfrey to give Toronto a quick 1-0 lead, lofted a sac fly to centre in the third to plate Darwin Barney, and capped off a three-run rising in the sixth with a double to centre to score Jose Bautista.
And it was a quintessential Justin Smoak moment, that, immediately after Stroman had coughed up a two-run double to Chicago catcher Omar Narvaez in the bottom of the fourth to tie the score, with two out in the top of the fifth and Donaldson on first with a walk, he powdered a 1-1 sinker by Pelfrey that stayed up in the zone, giving the Jays a lead they would not relinquish.
It would be interesting to go back, game by game, homer by homer, to look at the circumstances of every homer Smoak has hit this season. It seems to me that the preponderance of his dingers has either tied the game or given his team the lead.
Marcus Stroman has had an odd season, very much a contrast to the dominance that he showed in his first few major league starts after he was called up at the end of 2014, and the utter brilliance he displayed when he returned to the rotation in time to join up with David Price to lead Toronto to the division championship and a spot in the ALCS in 2015.
Now, despite his strong record of 9-5 and an ERA of 3.08 going into tonight’s game, it has become the norm that he will throw more pitches per inning, struggle with his control from time to time, and have to work his way out of far more pickles than you would expect from your team’s number one starter. In short, though he may get us there in the end, no one would confuse a Marcus Stroman outing with a strong start by a Max Scherzer or a Yu Darvish.
Tonight he retired the side in order in only one inning, the fifth, fortuitously the shut-down inning his team needed after Smoak’s homer in the top of the inning had restored the team’s lead. He kept his pitch down, and only walked one, but he still danced in and out of trouble.
For the rest, apart from the fifth, it went like this: first inning, a double by Jose Abreu, and three sparkling plays, two by Darwin Barney at second and one by Ryan Goins at shortstop, to turn tough ground balls into outs. Second inning, a walk to Tyler Saladino and a double-play ball to Narvaez. Third inning, a bloop double to left by Alex Hanson, subbing for the injured Willy Garcia, who’s been placed on the concussion disabled list after last night’s collision, and three ground ball outs.
In the fourth inning Stroman was more breaky than bendy as the White Sox scored two to tie the game. After getting by Abreu, Chicago’s most dangerous hitter, who hit the ball on the nose but right at Steve Pearce in left, he hit Matt Davidson on the wrist with a pitch, got the rookie Nicky Delmonico to hit into a force play, and then gave up two two-out base hits, a single by Saladino and a double by Narvaez that chased both runners home and knotted the game.
After his shutdown fifth, Stroman watched as his mates added on three more runs in the top of the sixth, and then came out and coughed up two runs to the first two batters he faced, a single to Abreu and a home run to Kevan Smith, who hit for Davidson, who was taken out as a precaution after being hit by Stroman in the fourth. With Toronto still holding a 7-4 lead and Stroman working on a pitch count that was still fairly low, manager John Gibbons opted to leave him in, and he proceeded to retire the side in order after the Smith homer.
The Jays added a run in the seventh (I’ll review the Toronto scoring in a moment; I just want to follow through on the StroStory first), and Stroman had come out of the two-run sixth still at a low of 79 pitches, so Gibbie trotted him out again for the seventh, and was rewarded with another full inning from his starter, while we were rewarded with another moment of wierdness from our favourite fiery pitcher. We’re not actually sure what happened, but somehow Stroman’s strikeout of leadoff hitter Tim Anderson led to nasty words between them, and a hasty invasion of the field by both benches.
Even in retrospect this seemed like a sandbox dispute between a couple of brats over which one gave the other the cut-eye first. As Anderson departed the field he was jawing at Stroman, who took no notice until the jawing continued even after Stroman had taken the ball back from Donaldson after the post-strikeout throwaround. Stroman did not like that. One bit. He came off the mound a couple steps toward Anderson, and shouted something to the effect of “WTF?” Anderson stopped in his tracks, shouted back, and here came the dugouts. Order was restored, no one was ejected, and no plausible explanation ever emerged as to what had transpired. The only thing we’re left with is kids in the sandbox.
After the fuss, Stroman popped up Hanson, gave up a base hit to Leury Garcia, and retired Yolmer Sanchez on a ground ball to second to end his night, having pitched seven innings, giving up four runs on seven hits with one walk, five strikeouts, and one temper flareup (a new category in the pitching line, just for MS), on 99 pitches. Typical night for the 2017 version of Marcus Stroman.
And fortunately for Marcus Stroman the Jays were opportunistic at the plate tonight and managed to provide enough support for him to claim the win. The Donaldson homer in the first gave him a stake, and in the third, for once, Toronto did not waste a leadoff double, this time by Darwin Barney. Jose Bautista lofted a deep fly to centre on which Barney tagged and moved up to third. From third with one out he was able to score on a Donaldson fly ball, also to centre. How many times have we railed over the failure of the Jays to capitalize on a leadoff double? This was one time that they came through for us.
After Stroman gave up the game-tying double in the fourth and Smoak’s homer re-established the lead in the fifth, the Blue Jays never trailed, picking up three more runs in the sixth to extend the lead to 7-2 before Smith’s homer cut it to 7-4 in the bottom of the sixth.
Pelfrey got the first two outs in the top of the sixth, then ran into trouble by giving up a walk to Kevin Pillar and a single to Barney. That was enough for Chicago manager Rick Renteria, who pulled the plug on Pelfrey and brought in the right-hander Gregory Infante, who appeared in five games for the White Sox way back in 2010, and then spent the last seven years wandering in the wilderness until being called up in mid-May, and since then has worked regularly out of the Chicago bullpen. Unfortunately, he didn’t bring much to the banquet tonight for the White Sox.
Infante walked Bautista to load the bases, gave up a two-run single to Russell Martin, letting both his inherited runners score, and then an RBI double to Donaldson, driving home Bautista, before finally fanning Smoak to end the inning.
Renteria sent Infante out for the eighth inning and he didn’t do any better than in the seventh; he faced three batters, gave up a run, and didn’t get anyone out. He walked Kendrys Morales and then gave up a booming double to the base of the wall in right centre by Steve Pearce. When centre fielder Leury Garcia crowded the wall and had the ball come back past him, it allowed the ponderous Morales to score all the way from first. Ryan Goins then lined a single to left, on which Pearce had to hold up, and only made it to third. This was the end for Infante.
Right-hander Juan Minaya, a late-May callup to Chicago’s bullpen, came in with runners on first and third and nobody out, and managed to retire the next three batters without allowing another run. He came out for the top of the eighth and fanned Donaldson before Renteria replaced him with the lefty David Holmberg, which turned Smoak and Morales around to hit right-handed (still don’t get the logic of this—they read every other statistic, don’t they see that both hit lefties better than righties?)
In any case, Holmberg survived a rocky two thirds in the eighth, giving up a single to Morales and hitting Pearce, then wild-pitching them to second and third, but popping up Smoak and Goins to get out of the inning.
Holmberg had a slightly smoother ride in the Toronto ninth, walking Pillar leading off but seeing him gunned down by Narvaez trying to steal, and giving up a two-out Texas League single to Bautista before fanning Russell Martin for the third out.
Ryan Tepera in the eighth inning and Dominic Leone in the ninth both had interesting adventures but managed to preserve the lead and the win for Stroman.
With one out in the eighth, Tepera actually gave up three consecutive hits, the latter two of the blooper variety, but the White Sox were kept off the board when Kevan Smith tried to score from second on Tyler Saladino’s Texas Leaguer to centre, but was cut down by a fantastic throw from Kevin Pillar, who charged the ball, picked it up on the fourth hop, and cut loose with a bomb that carried right into Martin’s glove just as Smith slid into it for the out. Buoyed up by the support, Tepera fanned Omar Narvaez to strand the runners at first and second.
Leone gave up a two-out triple to Leury Garcia in the ninth inning after Anderson fouled out to Zeke Carrera in left and Hanson struck out, but Sanchez left him there when he flied out to left to end the game.
So, sometimes it all works out, and sometimes, most of the time, actually, the bullpen protects a lead and delivers a win. It’s just that we’re not giving the bullpen enough leads to protect this year, and that’s a problem.
Tomorrow afternoon Jay Happ pitches for a series win against the White Sox. He should be going for a sweep.
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