If tonight’s game was an audition for Mike Bolsinger to stay in the rotation for a while, I don’t imagine he’s too hopeful of a call back any time soon.
There’s a spot for Bolsinger, or someone, at least until one of Jay Happ or Francisco Liriano comes back. It’s a given now that Joe Biagini has call on the last fill-in position, considering how well he’s done in his first two starts.
Bolsinger had a pretty good first outing, when he only had one bad inning out of five, giving up two runs in the second inning of a subsequent 6-0 Cleveland win in which he took the loss. Manager John Gibbons had to have hoped he might get at least a similar outing this time.
But Bolsinger, a control pitcher with a great curve ball, had all kinds of location problems tonight. Though he lasted four and two thirds innings, he gave up five earned runs on eight hits with two walks and three strikeouts, and, bizarrely, 3 hit batters. It’s a good thing he doesn’t throw very hard and they were all breaking balls or there would have been mayhem on the field. So there’s an open start in the rotation when Bolsinger’s number comes up again, but it’s an open question, or at least it should be, as to whether he gets that start.
But to be fair to Bolsinger, there was lots of other blame to be apportioned for this one, from some sloppy play in the field, to Leonel Campos grooving one late to Freddie Freeman for an extra three runs, to Manager John Gibbons, even, for giving up on this one too soon and letting Campos pitch to Freddie Freeman in the sixth inning.
And some of the blame has to go in the form of credit, to an Atlanta lineup that is relentless in attacking the pitcher, and fearless in facing down the pressure of two outs and ducks on the pond.
Right from the beginning, it seemed like Atlanta had to get down to crunch time before doing its damage. In the first inning, Bolsinger caught leadoff hitter Ender Inciarte looking on a 1-2 pitch. After the Inciarte strikeout, Bolsinger’s breaking ball riding in and hitting Brandon Phillips seemed innocuous enough, especially when sometime Canadian (kudos to him for donning the red for the World Baseball Classic) Freddie Freeman hit into a fielder’s choice from third for the second out.
But going up there with two outs was like catnip to Matt Kemp, whom I’m sure the Jays wanted to stuff in a (very big) locker by the end of the night. On an 0-1 pitch Kemp stroked a single into left. Freeman, who plays with brio, was going first to third almost from the crack of the bat.
If a first-inning mistake costing a run can be said to be a soul-destroying turning point, then a terrible throw by the normally sensible Zeke Carrera on Kemp’s ball was certainly one such. With the play in front of him, and no obvious chance of getting Freeman at third, Zeke decided to go for it anyway. Fair enough, but as he sometimes does, he airmailed it to the bag. The ball sailed over the cutoff man and of course Kemp sailed into second.
No problem. Two outs. Just get the hitter. No, big problem. Two outs is show time for these guys. And who was at the plate? None other than Nick Markakis, who spent a career wearing out the Blue Jays when he was an Oriole, and why did the Orioles let him go?
If I’m Mike Bolsinger, and in the position he’s in regarding the rotation, it bothers me a lot, a whole lot, to scuffle a bit in the first inning against a good-hitting team and come out down 2-0, rather than 1-0. So when Markakis inevitably grounded a base hit up the middle scoring two (it was remarkable how many ground ball base hits Atlanta seemed to be snaking through the infield, as if Toronto’s positioning was always just that one step off), it had to put Bolsinger in a hole in terms of his confidence, even if he did pop up Tyler Flowers to end the inning.
It didn’t exactly help Bolsinger that 43-year-old geezer Bartolo Colon whipped through the bottom of the first on ten pitches, as if he were facing a high school team.
And he sure didn’t help himself when he pinged off* right fielder Adonis Garcia on a 2-1 pitch leading off the second. Next thing you knew he was on third, stolen base to second, took third when Luke Maile’s throw ticked off Ryan Goins’ glove, and then off Devon Travis’. Well, third base and one out, since Jace Peterson struck out on the stolen base. So Dansby Swanson plated him with a sac fly, and it’s 3-0 Atlanta. Bolsie walked Ender Inciarte before getting Brandon Phillips to sky to centre.
*”Pinged off”: kid ballplayers in Toronto and area always used this term for getting hit by a pitch when I was coaching. Is it used generally, or is it local?
Maybe the baseball gods do distribute some justice, because Colon did a bit of showboating to retire his fourth straight in the bottom of the second. Kendrys Morales hit a hopper back to him, he picked it, took it out of his glove, and pretended to be counting the stitches or something while Morales laboured down the line. Finally, he roused himself from his torpor and tossed over for the out. That was immediately followed by Justin Smoak hitting one over Freddie Freeman’s head at first and into the corner where a fan touched it for a ground rule double. The outfield for Smoak was playing straight up despite the shift again. Don’t get it.
Then Devon Travis hit one deep to centre that one-hopped over the fence for back-to-back ground-rule doubles, and the Jays’ first run. Too bad they gave up the Garcia run. Too bad Zeke missed a cutoff man. Too bad it’s not 1-1 instead of 3-1 . . .
In the top of the third Bolsinger settled in and retired the side with eight pitches, though he had to throw a double play ball to Markakis to erase a Steve Kemp single. The Jays missed a chance in the bottom of the third to creep closer when Freddie Freeman made a really good snag of an errant throw from Danby Swanson at short to retire Kevin Pillar for the second out. The rushed throw was well off line and one-hopped Freeman, but he dipped way back into foul territory with his free foot to snag the throw for the out. Thing is, Colon then walked Zeke Carrera and gave up a single to right by Bautista that, with two outs, surely would have scored Pillar from second, but for Freeman keeping him off the bases. Still 3-1.
Another hit by pitch let Atlanta get another runner in scoring position to be cashed, making it 4-1, so that when the Jays answered in the bottom of the inning it was still a two-run deficit. Hard to play catchup when the other guys running away from you.
The Atlanta run was tinged with luck, but were it not for a great throw and tag by Bautista and Goins it could have been even worse. Catcher Tyler Flowers hit one off the end of his bat into centre for a single leading off the fourth. Adonis Garcia promptly replaced Flowers’ lack of speed with his own quickness by grounding into a fielder’s choice. Then Bolsinger hit the eight hitter Jace Peterson, his third hit batsman, pushing Garcia to second. Sigh. Of course the nine hitter Swanson hit one into the right-field corner to score Garcia, though he tried for two and Bautista and Goins combined for a nice throw and tag, while Peterson died at third.
So when Swanson returned the favour by throwing Travis’ infield single down the line allowing him to reach second, whence he scored on Mike Ohlman’s first major league hit and RBI, a single to centre, Toronto was still two down.
The fifth did Bolsinger in, not that you could see it coming. He quickly disposed of Phillips on a strikeout and Freeman on a lazy fly to Pillar, using only eight pitches, but then he hit the wall, and couldn’t finish the inning. You can thank Kemp and Markakis for that. Kemp waited out seven pitches then doubled to left. Markakis of course promptly singled him home for a 5-2 Atlanta lead. Bolsinger then walked Flowers. Pete Walker came out to talk to him, presumably because lefty J. P. Howell wasn’t ready. Too bad for everybody, because Garcia ticked one off Goins’ glove into centre that scored Markakis. Then Howell came in and got a groundout from Jace Peterson to end the inning, but it was now 6-2 for the visitors.
You can imagine, then, that when Kevin Pillar led off the bottom of the inning with a single and eventually came around to score on a double by Jose Bautista, it kind of felt like too little too late, and small potatoes at that, since Smoak walked with two outs after the Bautista double, but two-out base hits only seemed to be in the cards for Atlanta, as Travis grounded out to third. 6-3.
In the sixth John Gibbons sent Howell back out there, but in quick order he gave up a double to Swanson and a bunt single to Inciarte, and Gibbie came out with the hook. Strangely, with four innings left to hit and down only three runs, he brought in the least experienced member of the bullpen, the newly-returned Leonel Campos, who fanned the first batter he faced, Brandon Phillips, bringing up Freddie Freeman.
In bringing in Campos, and allowing him to pitch to Freeman, did Gibbie think based on one good inning that he was the right guy for the job? We’ll never really know why him, but we sure know what happened, as he coughed up a three-run homer to Freeman that iced the game for Atlanta.
I worry here that the Toronto manager is starting to think in rigid terms about how to use his bullpen. Tonight, Ryan Tepera and Dominic Leone, who might have filled this role in the sixth, weren’t available for sure because of significant stints on Sunday against the Mariners. But Danny Barnes was last used on Saturday, and Joe Smith on Friday. Could it be that Campos was the choice because it was the sixth inning, and not time for the seventh-inning guy Barnes, and not time for the eighth-inning guy Smith?
When I coached, I learned quickly in tournament situations that you have to win the one you’re in, and you can’t worry about the semifinal until you’ve actually arrived there. Saving your best pitcher for a final that you didn’t make would qualify as a kids’ baseball version of Showaltering Zac Britton. If you don’t put out the fire in the sixth, the rest of the game doesn’t matter.
In any case a 6-3 deficit faced by a team that’s starting to score runs in bunches was turned into a blowout because arguably the best hitter in baseball at the moment was allowed to hit against an inexperienced callup.
Once the homer had been hit, it made sense to leave Campos in and have him eat some outs if he could, since the game was out of hand. After Freeman’s blast Campos gave up a run of his own, yielding a double to Matt Kemp, hitting Tyler Flowers, the fourth Toronto hit batsman in the game, and seeing Kemp score on a little (two-out, of course) flare to right by Adonis Garcia. 10-3 Atlanta.
From this point it hardly mattered that the Jays scored in the bottom of the seventh when reliever Ian Krol got two quick outs, then walked Morales and Smoak before coughing up Travis’ second double of the night to score Morales.
It should be noted that amidst the dreary dregs of this game Aaron Loup, who came on in the eighth to pick up Campos, while going about his business hit Nick Markakis with a pitch. The five hit batsmen by Toronto pitchers set a new franchise record for a single game.
There was one last bittersweet moment in the bottom of the ninth, when after Jose Bautista led off with a single against Josh Collmenter and Kendrys Morales flied out to left, Justin Smoak who continues to surge as the team’s leading power source hit a no-doubt blast to right that made the final score 10-6. The most bittersweet aspect, of course, being that if you subtract the extra run in the first caused by Carrera’s bad throw, Garcia’s run in the second after being hit by a pitch, stealing second, and advancing to third on a throwing error, Garcia’s run in the fourth after he’d been moved into scoring position when Bolsinger hit Peterson, and add the run the Jays didn’t score because of Freeman’s great scoop that killed an infield hit by Pillar, the game was tied. And we’re not even talking about whether Smith or Barnes would have given up the Freeman home run.
Ah yes, if wishes were horses . . .
After this great run lately, we were due for a stinker. This one was stinker enough for two streaks, so let’s start another tomorrow. Please.
Leave a Reply