TORONTO — The hardest thing to do as opportunity slowly slips away and a season’s work gets pushed closer to the brink the way it is for the Toronto Blue Jays right now is to trust in process over outcomes.
Through five fruitless innings against all-star Lance Lynn on Monday night, for example, they had managed only two baserunners, one on a Santiago Espinal single and one when Yoan Moncada booted a routine Teoscar Hernandez grounder at third.
The logical conclusion would be that Lynn was dicing them up, sending them deeper into their recent offensive funk. Yet within those five frames, the Blue Jays hit seven balls with an expected batting average ranging from .500-.750 — only one of them resulting in a knock. Factor in another liner to left field from Hernandez that carried a .410 xBA, and rather than scrambling to figure out what was wrong, there was a case to be made that they should stay right there.
Carrying the cumulative frustration of seven losses in nine outings, however, that’s easier said than done, which is why Vladimir Guerrero Jr., pumped his fist three times when he reached second base after a line-drive single to centre in the sixth tied the game at 1-1.
You think Vlad Jr was fired up about that game-tying RBI or what? pic.twitter.com/Zp0uHqMN0X
— Tim and Friends (@timandfriends) August 24, 2021
The moment of catharsis didn’t open the floodgates, but it did help set the stage for the Blue Jays to score the go-ahead run on a Craig Kimbrel wild pitch in the eighth inning of a 2-1 victory over the Chicago White Sox. Given the club’s recent run of gut-punch losses, pinch-runner Breyvic Valera’s dash home, sneaking in his left hand as he absorbed the spikes of a sliding Kimbrel applying the tag, made you believe that baseball karma eventually balances all.
Certainly it wasn’t easy, but the Blue Jays managed to take advantage of six strong innings from Alek Manoah, who worked around five hits and three walks to allow just one run while being grounded for 108 pitches.
And they got three clean innings of relief from their bullpen: Adam Cimber working around a Reese McGuire catcher’s interference in the seventh, Tim Mayza mowing through the eighth and Jordan Romano locking matters down in the ninth.
The Blue Jays’ determination was embodied by Guerrero, who aside from ripping the key RBI single, also made a nice scoop on a Marcus Semien relay to complete a tough 6-4-3 double play on a Jose Abreu grounder to end the seventh.
McGuire then started the pivotal rally in the eighth with a single and was replaced by Valera, who took second when Bo Bichette struck out on a wild pitch and third on a Semien groundout. Every step of his leadoff from third mattered on his pivotal dash home.
