ANAHEIM, Calif. – Mulling over what he liked about the Toronto Blue Jays during their season-opening, 10-game road trip, Matt Chapman quickly pointed to one trait he sees across all areas of the club.
“I like the resiliency of this team,” he said before a wild Sunday in which his sixth-inning grand slam started a rally from a six-run deficit, Jordan Romano blew a three-run lead in the ninth and Kevin Kiermaier and George Springer drove in runs in the 10th for a 12-11 victory Sunday over the Los Angeles Angels. “We had some things that didn’t go our way early … Guys are taking good at-bats. Defensively, we’ve done some good things we can build off. So I feel like there are a lot of positives.”
The stunning comeback, before an Angel Stadium crowd of 31,092 under a clear, blue California sky, underlined that and left the Blue Jays at 6-4 heading into Tuesday’s home opener against the 2-7 Detroit Tigers at the renovated Rogers Centre.
For most of the afternoon they didn’t seem likely to board their cross-continent flight happy as a first-inning sun-ball dropped in beside Daulton Varsho and led to a three-run first against Yusei Kikuchi, who later allowed homers to Shohei Ohtani and Logan O’Hoppe to create a 6-0 hole.
Lefty Reid Detmers, meanwhile, allowed only two hits and a walk through before unravelling in the sixth after a leadoff walk to George Springer.
Bo Bichette followed with a single, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., was hit on the left foot to load the bases and Chapman hammered a cookie fastball on the next pitch to give everyone an easy trip home.
Varsho followed with a brilliant bunt single before reliever Andrew Wentz whiffed on a Whit Merrifield to the mound to put runners on first and second. Two outs later, Kevin Kiermaier plated them both with a triple.
After a crucial shutdown inning from Adam Cimber, the Blue Jays went to work against a couple of old friends. Ryan Tepera hit Bichette, gave up a bloop single to Guerrero, watched Chapman break the tie on a bull dunked into centre before Whit Merrifield rolled a ball through the 5-6 hole for some insurance.
That’s when Aaron Loup took over and he struck out Cavan Biggio before an intentional walk to pinch-hitter Alejandro Kirk, only for Kiermaier to deliver a two-run single that opened up a 10-6 edge. Notably, Kiermaier stopped Biggio as he was walking back to the dugout for a quick chat, presumably for a little intel.
Yimi Garcia worked through the heart of the Angels lineup in the seventh and Erik Swanson gave up an O’Hoppe homer in the eighth before Romano couldn’t nail things down in the ninth, hitting Anthony Rendon with the bases loaded before a two-run Hunter Renfroe double.
In the 10th, the Blue Jays pounced quickly when Kiermaier ripped a ground-rule double and Springer brought him home with an RBI single. Then Trevor Richards loaded the bases with two out in the bottom half, induced a first-pitch foul pop up from Mike Trout that Kirk misjudged, let fall and walked the Angels slugger to make it a one-run game before Tim Mayza got Ohtani on a weak grounder to second.
Pivotal to the Blue Jays’ resiliency thus far has been the play of Chapman, a force of nature through the first 10 games. He reached in four of his six plate appearances, with one of his outs coming on a 98.8 m.p.h. rocket to the mound.
Over the winter, he dropped his leg kick in favour of a toe-tap and has looked dangerous every time up.
“I have big goals this season,” he said. “I really felt like I had a higher ceiling than what I’d been showing. I’ve shown it in spurts throughout the courses of different years and I’ve had good seasons before. But I’ve used all that I’ve learned and I felt like I tried to just put the best version of myself out there. Getting early success helps, it lets you know that you’re doing the right thing. Obviously I’m not going to hit .400 the rest of the season – who knows, maybe I’ll break a record – but the biggest thing I can take is what I worked on this off-season translates.”
