TORONTO – The evening began like this for the Toronto Blue Jays.
Yup, that’s right, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hit into a triple play with runners on second and third. It went 1-3-2-5-6 for those of you scoring at home, and for the odds of that happening, well, tack on a few zeroes at the end of that combination and it’s one in that, surely.
Then, in the top of the second, T.J. Zeuch took a potential double-play ball with men on the corners, and after looking the runner back at third, did this:
So, instead of building a big lead in the first and putting the New York Yankees bullpen on call early, the Blue Jays instead gifted their visitors a run, needed a miraculous escape to keep it from being more, and watched Gio Urshela hit a two-run homer for a 3-0 lead in the third.
Not exactly how you want to start a salvage-the-series, bounce-back-attempt night.
Impressively, the Blue Jays shook that off, and grinded their way into a 4-3 lead they carried into the seventh, with a Randal Grichuk single cashing in Guerrero with the go-ahead run in the bottom of the sixth. Once there, they immediately gave it up for the third time in the series, Giancarlo Stanton hitting a go-ahead two-run homer off Anthony Castro, who left two runners aboard that pinch-hitter Chris Gittens brought home with a two-out single off Tom Mayza.
In that way, an 8-4 loss Thursday that completed a three-game Yankees sweep in which each game could have, and probably should have, gone the other way, heaped an especially big dose of pain on a Blue Jays team reeling from a long line of disheartening losses.
They lost for the eighth time when leading after six innings, four of them coming in the last week. At 33-34, they fell below .500 for the first time since they dropped to 11-12 on April 28. And while yet another bullpen implosion wasn’t necessarily a surprise given how deep they are down the reliever depth chart, the sloppy play that showed up certainly was, and may be a sign of players trying too hard to change the club’s fortune.
A three-game series in Baltimore opening Friday is perhaps the antidote they need most right now as last year the Blue Jays went 8-2 against the Orioles. Ten of their next 18 games are with the AL East cellar-dwellers and running through those games at a similar clip would certainly help turn their fortunes.
But with their bullpen thinned out by injuries and in disarray with too many relievers overexposed, Castro being Exhibit A right now, pulling that off won’t be easy.
Rafael Dolis, who left Wednesday’s 3-2 loss with a numbing sensation in his right hand, hit the injured list Thursday with what the team called a right middle finger strain. Zeuch took his spot and may not be long for the club, especially with Montoyo needing six relievers to cover the final six frames.
The saving grace for the team right now is the way it keeps getting back up after each knock down. Right after the Yankees took a 3-0 lead Thursday, the Blue Jays scratched out a pair in the bottom half on a Reese McGuire RBI double and Bo Bichette run-scoring groundout. Marcus Semien tied things up in the fifth with another run-scoring groundout and Grichuk put them ahead in the sixth with his base hit off the ever-tough Chad Green.
But when Cavan Biggio followed with a deep fly to right that Aaron Judge pulled back from over the fence, it was an omen of things to come.
