TORONTO – On the morning of April 16, 2018, a chunk of ice fell from the CN Tower and punctured a hole about a metre wide by two metres long in the thin PVC sheeting that covers the Rogers Centre roof. The impact was strong enough to trip alarms inside the stadium and attached hotel. Smaller shards had caused damage elsewhere on the lid, too, causing some flooding in the building. Quite obviously, the Toronto Blue Jays and Kansas City Royals were postponed that night, leading to a doubleheader the next day.
The circumstances leading to the fourth-ever twinbill at the dome were markedly different, but the results were different as this one ended in a split, the Blue Jays taking the opener 1-0 on a Marcus Semien walk-off homer, the Boston Red Sox rallying for a 2-1, eight-inning victory in Saturday’s nightcap.
Gems from Robbie Ray in the first game and Jose Berrios in the second put the Blue Jays in position to take both games. But Alex Verdugo’s game-tying homer in the sixth inning off Berrios tied the second game 1-1 and after the Red Sox gave away two outs on the bases in seventh inning, Jonathan Arauz’s RBI single to open the eighth provided the winning margin.
Adam Ottavino closed things out in the bottom half to end a five-game winning streak for the Blue Jays (59-50), who are 8-2 since returning to Toronto. The Red Sox (65-48), won for just the second time in their past 10 outings, a stretch that’s tightened up the standings.
Either way, the Blue Jays have pulled themselves back into the hunt and a victory in Sunday’s series finale when Hyun Jin Ryu starts against Garrett Richards would certainly help.
“We’re kind of clicking on all cylinders,” said Ray. “That’s something we talked about earlier in the year, it seemed like when we were pitching, the hitting was lagging behind, when we were hitting really well, we were giving up runs. It feels like right now that everything’s coming together. We’re pitching really good. We’re hitting, guys are getting on base, we’re getting them over, getting them in. We’re doing the small things. This really fun. And especially to be able to do it here in Toronto in front of the home crowd is great.”
A crowd of 14,768 watched the first game and 12,659 took in the second on a unique day for several reasons, and not only because it’s the first time there’s been a split doubleheader at Rogers Centre. The extra game is a makeup of a July 20 rainout in Buffalo, N.Y., and given the option of sneaking in another game onto their Toronto schedule, the Blue Jays immediately seized the opportunity.
Adding to the unusual circumstances is that the Red Sox were hit by some COVID-19 issues, with bench coach Will Venable testing positive and first-base coach Tom Goodwin in quarantine for exposure. Slugger J.D. Martinez was also placed on the COVID-19 injured list, joining Jarren Duran there, leading to manager Alex Cora and several others to mask up in the visitor’s dugout.
The Red Sox are beneath Major League Baseball’s 85 per cent vaccination threshold.
“We have to be careful, right?” said Cora. “We’ve got to take care of our group. As for now, we’ll do our best to wear masks in the dugout and obviously inside.”
Semien’s first career walk-off homer – on the first pitch from fellow all-star Matt Barnes – capped off the first game in which Ray threw six two-hit, two-walk innings with five strikeouts before making way for closer Jordan Romano in the seventh.
Both Ray and Pivetta starters carried no-hitters into the fifth inning and the first real threat came from the Red Sox in the sixth, when Bobby Dalbec opened the inning with a walk and Jonathan Arauz, after failing to get a sacrifice bunt down, lined a single to left.
Ray recovered to strikeout Kike Hernandez before Alex Verdugo hit into a controversial fielder’s choice, as he beat the throw at first but missed the bag. The Blue Jays challenged and a crowd of 14,768 roared as they saw the replay and then booed when he was ruled safe, possibly because Lourdes Gurriel Jr.’s foot slid back into the basepath altering Verdugo’s path.
No matter, Ray promptly induced an inning-ending pop-up from Xander Bogaerts to escape the jam.
“I knew it wasn’t just going to be a cut and dry thing because (Gurriel) missed the bag,” Ray said of the Verdugo play. “It looks like he’s out and it was taking a long time for them to make the decision on it, so something just didn’t seem right to me. I just tried to stay focused through some extra warm-up pitches there to (Alejandro Kirk), kind of get my focus back. When they called him safe, at that point I was already locked in and ready to go.”
Pivetta, the Victoria native, was even stingier, allowing only a Corey Dickerson single in the fifth and George Springer walk in the sixth over his six innings of work.
The nightcap was tight, too, with the Blue Jays breaking through first when a Breyvic Valera single cashed in Bo Bichette with the game’s first run. But the Red Sox stymied the Blue Jays from there, with Barnes delivering a clean seventh – helped by Kike Hernandez’s leaping grab of a Vladimir Guerrero Jr., smash against the centre-field wall – forced extra innings.
Bichette made a brilliant play to save a run and end the sixth, ranging to his right to snare a 95.8 m.p.h. Hunter Renfroe smash on his backhand, and then one-hopping a throw across the diamond that Guerrero cleverly picked.
McGuire then helped Trevor Richards escape the seventh after the first two Red Sox batters reached, picking off Marwin Gonzalez at second base for the first out and then getting Christian Vazquez trying to steal third on a Franchy Cordero strikeout.
