Series Preview: New York Yankees (4-5) vs. Toronto Blue Jays (4-5)
In which the Toronto Blue Jays continue to become #FloridaGuys
This is just a hunch, but I think Mike Trout may be good at baseball.
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GAME 1
TD Place Ballpark saw its home opener today, officially making the Toronto Blue Jays the third Florida-based Major League Baseball team, proving that baseball in Florida has been a massive success.
First blood in the first game went to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, Orange County, California, as a Mike Trout double and Anthony Rendon single off of Jays starter Ross Stripling gave the Halos a 1-0 lead in the top of the first. The Jays would strike back in the bottom half of the inning though, as Cavan Biggio reached base with a one-out walk. After a Bo Bichette groundout to nudge Biggio into scoring position, Teoscar Hernández would drive a single into right field to score him. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. would crush a Griffin Canning slider that caught too much of the plate to give the Blue Jays a 3-1 lead.
The lead wouldn’t last, however, as Justin Upton and José Iglesias would hit back-to-back hard doubles to start the top of the second inning and cut the lead to one. After striking out Kurt Suzuki and getting a soft flyout from Dexter Fowler caught by a diving Randal Grichuk after a bad jump, soft contact maestro David Fletcher stroked a soft double into right field to score Iglesias and tie the game. Shohei Ohtani would then crush a line drive to right field that was speared by a leaping Guerrero for the third out.
Both Stripling and Canning would settle down after each giving up three runs. The man known as Chicken Strip struggled with his fastball command out of the gate, but would only walk one while striking out five in five innings. He would only give up one more earned run after the second on a Trout home run that’s probably nearing Proxima Centauri at the time of writing (in related news, Trout is slashing .700/.727/1.700 with three home runs in 11 career plate appearances against Stripling). Overall, a solid, if not terrific start.
Canning, who was making his first start of the season, would strike out seven Blue Jays in 5 ⅓ while only walking one. The knockout punch to the 24-year-old would come at the hands of Cavan Biggio, who would tie the game at 4 in the sixth with a solo home run to right centre field. Canning would give way to Former Ray Aaron Slegers (whose defining characteristic as a pitcher is apparently “being really fucking tall”) who promptly gave up a swinging bunt single to Bo Bichette. After punching out Hernández, Guerrero would pound a hard ground ball base hit up the middle to give the Jays a 5-4 lead.
Like all good things in this game though this lead would not last. Trent Thornton, who relieved Stripling in the sixth, began the seventh with a strikeout of Kurt Suzuki but gave up a base hit to Dexter Fowler, who would steal second base. Jordan Romano would come in to try to protect the lead, but alas, it was not meant to be. Fletcher moved Fowler over to third on a groundout, setting the table for Shohei Ohtani, who crushed a single to right field to tie the game right back up.
Tony Watson and Mike Mayers would keep the Jays off the scoreboard in the seventh and eighth innings, while David Phelps would pitch a clean eighth for Toronto. Julian Merryweather came into the ninth inning and immediately struck out Suzuki (I’m noticing a pattern) but gave up a soft single to Fowler on a 100 mph fastball. Fletcher popped out to Guerrero, but Merryweather, who didn’t look quite as sharp as he did against the Yankees, lost the strike zone against Ohtani, walking him to put a runner in scoring position for Mike Trout, of all people.
Fish Man would crush a line drive to centre field, only to have what looked like a go-ahead base hit land in the glove of a diving Randal Grichuk, the man drafted by the Angels in the spot directly before Trout’s.
Grichuk and Joe Panik would both fly out against Steve Cishek to start the bottom of the ninth. The mightily struggling Rowdy Tellez would come in to pinch-hit for Danny Jansen and would work a seven-pitch walk to get on base, getting promptly replaced for pinch-runner Jonathan Davis.
And then this happened.
Look at the tiny movement towards home plate that Cishek does before twirling and firing the ball to Walsh to pick off Davis for the third out. That’s a balk. It just so happens that neither Davis, nor the Blue Jays bench, nor the goddamn umpires were able to pick up on it. So instead of seeing Davis on second with Marcus Semien up to bat, we got to see the extra innings and the dumbass runner-on-second rule. Lucky us!
Merryweather would come out for the tenth with the speedy Mike Trout on second base. He would punch out Anthony Rendon on a nasty 88 mph slider and would get Jared Walsh to ground out on a scary ground ball that the pitcher himself bobbled and flipped to Vladimir Guerrero Jr. at first to get the second out. Justin Upton would smash a fly ball right to Grichuk to give the Jays a chance to walk it off in the bottom of the tenth.
With Alejandro Kirk waiting on second base and Junior Guerra on the mound for the Angels, Marcus Semien would put up a good fight, making it to ten pitches before grounding out to the first baseman Walsh. Biggio would be frozen on an inside fastball for strike three and Bichette would go down chasing a low splitter, leaving Kirk stranded at second.
Pain.
In the top of the eleventh, Ryan Borucki would concede a leadoff walk to José Iglesias. Kurt Suzuki figured a way around constantly striking out by laying down a sacrifice bunt, moving Iglesias and Upton to second and third, respectively. Borucki would strike out Fowler on a pretty slider before getting replaced by Rafael Dolis, who immediately gave up a base hit to David Fletcher on a high sinker, driving in both runs to give the Angels a 7-5 lead.
P A I N
Shohei Ohtani would ground out to end the inning, leaving the Jays needing to push across two runs to tie and three to win. Bo Bichette, a fast runner at second, would watch as all three of Teoscar Hernández, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., and Lourdes Gurriel Jr. would strike out against Angels closer Raisel Iglesias. Final score: Angels 7, Blue Jays 5.
GAME 2
After the discouraging loss on Thursday night, the Jays would immediately run into problems both injury- and COVID-related. Teoscar Hernández was placed on the COVID IL after someone he was in contact with tested positive for coronavirus. Ryan Borucki was also placed on the COVID IL while feeling the side effects of the vaccine. Reliever Tyler Chatwood would also land on the IL with right triceps inflammation. A shitty beginning to a shitty day.
On the more positive side, a couple of new Blue Jays would get called up to make their MLB debuts as replacements for Teo, Borucki, and Chatwood. Along with reliever and waiver wire pinball Joel Payamps, outfielder Josh Palacios would be inserted into the starting lineup, and Ty Tice would assume a spot in the bullpen.
For the first time this year, the Jays used an opener, as David Phelps took the mound in the first inning. He would set things up nicely for T.J. Zeuch, as he got David Fletcher to ground out, struck out Shohei Ohtani, walked Mike Trout, and struck out Anthony Rendon. Zeuch got a soft swinging bunt from Jared Walsh that was just soft enough to turn into an infield single. After striking out Justin Upton and getting José Iglesias to fly out, Max Stassi chopped another infield single to put runners on first and second. Dexter Fowler would follow that up with a walk to load the bases with two out.
Zeuch got what he needed: A ground ball right at Bo Bichette. However, Bichette had trouble handling the ball, and his throw to Marcus Semien at second didn’t make it in time to get Fowler, allowing the runner to score. Unfortunately, Fowler would hurt himself on the play and would have to be carted off the field with a torn left ACL: A season-ending injury. Shitty news for Fowler, a veteran hoping to make an impact on this Angels team and who faces a challenging path back to MLB playing time, as he’ll be 36 at the start of next season. Here’s hoping he gets a shot to build on an excellent career.
Back to the game, where Ohtani hit a deep line drive that landed for a bases-clearing double to give the Angels a 4-0 lead. It wouldn’t get any better from there for the Jays, who would see Lourdes Gurriel Jr. removed from the game as he experienced side effects from the coronavirus vaccine, eventually joining Borucki on the COVID IL. Zeuch would keep the deficit at 4 until the fifth when Ohtani demolished a sinker for a solo home run. Trout would follow him up with a double and Walsh would stroke a deeeeeep fly ball into the night beyond right field to give the Angels a 7-0 lead.
The Blue Jays’ offence wouldn’t pose much of a threat at all against starting pitcher Andrew Heaney (six innings, nine strikeouts, two walks, no hits), and relievers Alex Claudio and Chris Rodriguez with their sole run coming on a wild pitch by Rodriguez that scored Semien. The only real bright spots came from emergency call-ups Joel Payamps, who continued to look solid with three strikeouts in 2 ⅔ innings of shutout ball, and Ty Tice, who made his big league debut and threw two shutout innings. The only near-mistakes from Tice came off of a few hard hits, with Trout once again driving a ball to deep left field, with this one landing neatly in Jonathan Davis’ glove instead of on Mars. Decent low-leverage innings will only take you so far when you can’t hit at all though, and the Jays would go down with a whimper 7-1, their first consecutive loss, prompting a lot of posts on social media that I feel blessed not to have seen.
GAME 3
With Gurriel still out but Borucki returning from the COVID IL, Tice’s thanks for his two solid innings was a trip back to the alternate site in exchange for infielder Santiago Espinal in a slap in the face to short kings everywhere that will not soon be forgiven. Espinal would start the game at third base as Cavan Biggio got the day off and got to meet Albert Pujols courtesy of Vladimir Guerrero Jr., which was sweet.
Steven Matz would run into some trouble in the first as Shohei Ohtani hit a one-out triple followed by a walk to Mike Trout. Matz would wiggle out of the jam though, striking out Anthony Rendon and getting Pujols to ground out. That would be the only jam Matz would get into, with his sole blemish coming at the hands of Anthony Rendon, who hit a solo jack off of him in the top of the fourth. The lefty would otherwise be solid, going six innings with three walks, four strikeouts and five hits. Not as dominant as he was against the Rangers, but safe to say the Angels are a much better offence. Matz continues to show some good early returns in the early goings of his comeback season.
The Jays’ offence, scuffling until this point, would finally put it together tonight, spearheaded by Bo Bichette, Guerrero, Randal Grichuk, and, as we all predicted, Santiago Espinal and Josh Palacios.
In related news, José Quintana did not have a good night.
Espinal began the bottom of the second inning with a line drive single to right field. Jonathan Davis would walk to put runners on first and second, and Danny Jansen would hit a ground ball to David Fletcher, instigating one of the more bizarre plays I’ve ever seen live.
Just trying to interpret this fucking thing is giving me a headache. Let’s see if watching the video helps matters.
…
Nope. Not even remotely. Let’s just move on.
Palacios would bunt a ball up the third base line to load the bases. After Marcus Semien struck out swinging, both Bichette and Guerrero would walk to push two runs in. Grichuk would clear the bases afterwards, ripping a double to left field. While Rowdy Tellez would strike out (ROWDY, PLEASE), Espinal would come back to bat to poke a soft ground ball into right field, giving the Jays a 7-0 lead and knocking Quintana out of the game to give way to Jaime Barría, who wouldn’t end up doing all that much better.
In the bottom of the third, Palacios and Semien worked two one-out walks, setting the table for a Bichette double and Guerrero single to give the Jays a 10-0 lead. The bottom of the fourth wouldn’t go much better for Barría.
After that sequence of what I’m pretty sure fits the definition of bullying to a tee, the Angels turned things over to Junior Guerra, who gave them 3 ⅓ innings of solid garbage time relief. In the bottom of the eighth, the Angels would go with tall man Aaron Slegers once again, who would give up a Palacios single, a wild pitch, and a single to defensive sub Joe Panik to make it 15-1 Blue Jays. That’s where the score would stand, as Tommy Milone would come into the seventh inning to eat three innings of scoreless, six-strikeout relief to put the Angels out of their misery while also apparently earning a save, because fuck it, why not?
GAME 4
God didn’t want Tanner Roark to pitch either, so the clouds opened up. The game will be made up as part of a doubleheader in August at Angel Stadium.
BEST BIRDS
Hitter: Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (1) (15 plate appearances, .500/.667/.800, 290 wRC+, 0.34 WPA)
Pitcher: Julian Merryweather (2) (2 innings, 8 batters faced, 1 hit, 2 strikeouts, 1 walk, 2.65 FIP, 0.47 WPA)
For the record: If I had been awarding Best Birds for the previous two series, they would’ve gone to Randal Grichuk and Merryweather for the Yankees series, as well as Marcus Semien and Steven Matz for the Rangers series.
POINTS OF INTEREST
Teo Goes to Quarantine
On Saturday morning, the Jays placed Teoscar Hernández on the COVID IL after someone he had been in contact with tested positive. He’s going to be out for a week while quarantining.
While his absence has opened up a spot on the team for Josh Palacios, who has impressed in his short two-game stint thus far, it doesn’t come at the best time for the Jays, who are down not only Hernández but George Springer and Tyler Chatwood. Lourdes Gurriel Jr. and Ryan Borucki have also missed time due to side effects from taking the COVID vaccine, which does also suck, but hey, at least the Jays are taking the vaccine and not going on weird, unhinged social media rants about it!
Diesel Engine Recall Notice
Tanner Roark’s scheduled start against the Angels was mercifully prevented by the blessed, blessed rains of North Florida, called forth by the storm gods in a rare act of mercy towards the Jays. In return, instead of having him start the first game against the New York Yankees (*tugs collar*) the Jays have offered to sacrifice Roark’s spot in the starting rotation, moving him to the bullpen.
In my recap of his last start and commentary thereafter, I took many words to say that Roark has lost all redeeming qualities as a starting pitcher. Anybody who’s seen most of his 2020 starts, or his game last Tuesday against Texas, can see what I mean. While he was throwing a little harder than he had in 2020, and he cut down on the use of his sinker (going from 22.3% in 2020 to 5.1% against the Rangers) that didn’t improve his results. It truly looked like he was lobbing batting practice into the middle of the strike zone. You could squint and say that his walk rates are okay despite his bad command, but only because hitters are crushing his pitches before he has a chance to get to four balls. To say nothing about the fact that you can’t justify keeping a terrible innings-eater in the rotation when he’s not even eating any goddamn innings.
I don’t take any joy in being this critical of any player, especially one like Roark who seems, by all accounts, to be a pretty nice, self-deprecating guy. But the fact of the matter is that he has no business being in a Major League rotation, much less in the rotation of a contending team.
For the moment, Roark will be shifted to bullpen duty, where one would assume he will handle the garbagiest of garbage time innings. How long can the Jays justify keeping him there? Probably not long, but Nate Pearson and Tyler Chatwood both being out may buy them some time on that front.
ROSTER/INJURY UPDATES
We’ve already gone through most of these, but to recap:
Teoscar Hernández is on the COVID IL after being in contact with someone who has tested positive. If all goes well, he’ll be ready to come back during or after the series in Kansas City later this week.
Ryan Borucki was placed on and has returned from the COVID IL.
Lourdes Gurriel Jr. was placed on and has returned from the COVID IL.
Tyler Chatwood was placed on the IL with a right triceps inflammation. His timetable is thus far unknown.
Robbie Ray has been activated from the 10-day IL.
Josh Palacios has been called up from the alternate site.
Ty Tice was called up from the alternate site only to promptly be sent down the next day.
Joel Payamps was called up from the alternate site. He has since been sent down.
Santiago Espinal was called up from the alternate site only to promptly be sent down the next day.
George Springer is “not on the brink of returning”, according to Charlie Montoyo.
SCHEDULE/PROBABLE PITCHERS
Monday, April 12 (7 p.m. EST/5 p.m. MST): Gerrit Cole vs. Robbie Ray
Cole: Two starts, 12 ⅓ innings, 1.46 ERA/1.59 xERA/2.27 xFIP/1.81 SIERA, 43.8 K%, 4.2 BB%, 36 HardHit%
Ray: First start of the season (2019/20 stats: 4.86 ERA/4.24 xFIP/4.34 SIERA, 30.4 K%, 12.9 BB%, 40.4 HardHit%)
Tuesday, April 13 (7 p.m. EST/5 p.m. MST): Jameson Taillon vs. Hyun-Jin Ryu
Taillon: One start, 4 ⅔ innings, 3.86 ERA/4.90 xERA/2.83 xFIP/2.04 SIERA, 41.2 K%, 0 BB%, 50 HardHit%
Ryu: Two starts, 12 ⅓ innings, 2.92 ERA/3.75 xERA/2.92 xFIP/3.01 SIERA, 24.5 K%, 2 BB%, 30.6 HardHit%
Wednesday, April 14 (1 p.m. EST/11 a.m. MST): Corey Kluber vs. Ross Stripling
Kluber: Two starts, 6 ⅓ innings, 5.68 ERA/4.38 xERA/5.18 xFIP/4.83 SIERA, 24.2 K% 15.2 BB%, 47.4 HardHit%
Stripling: Two starts, 8 ⅓ innings, 7.56 ERA/7.58 xERA/4.40 xFIP/4.00 SIERA, 24.4 K%, 7.3 BB%, 50 HardHit%
THE OPPOSING NARRATIVE
Yankees’ record vs. Blue Jays: 1-2
Record since the last series vs. Blue Jays: 3-3
Run differential: +5 (38 runs scored, 33 runs allowed)
Top 5 Players:
Gerrit Cole, Starting Pitcher (0.6 fWAR, 0.6 bWAR)
D.J. LeMahieu, Second Base/First Base (0.4 fWAR, 0.3 bWAR)
Chad Green, Relief Pitcher (0.2 fWAR, 0.5 bWAR)
Gary Sánchez, Catcher (0.3 fWAR, 0.3 bWAR)
Jordan Montgomery, Starting Pitcher (0.3 fWAR, 0.3 bWAR)
It’s panic time in New York! By which I mean that the Yankees are good, a 4-5 start is far from the end of the world, and it’s way too early to make conclusions, but I’m sure the team’s fans are freaking out about something anyways.
I’m only too happy to indulge Yankees fans in their doomposting though. New York hasn’t exactly dominated the competition coming into this series, and in terms of offence, they’ve had to rely pretty much entirely on D.J. LeMahieu, Aaron Judge (who missed a couple of games with definitely-not-an-oblique-issue) and Gary Sánchez (which ten bucks says hasn’t stopped New York fans from finding as many reasons as possible to hate him). Luke Voit is still out while recovering from knee surgery, and Luis Severino is still on the mend from Tommy John surgery.
While the Yankees have otherwise been lucky enough to avoid any major long-term injuries to their regulars (sorry Miguel Andújar) at this point, they’ve had to deal with several shorter absences from Judge, third baseman Gio Urshela and relievers Aroldis Chapman and Justin Wilson. This is to say nothing about the underperformance they’ve seen from the likes of Aaron Hicks, Giancarlo Stanton, Gleyber Torres, Urshela, and Clint Frazier. They’ve had to rely a bit on their role players, such as outfielder Brett Gardner, and the newly, bizarrely acquired infielder Rougned Odor, who has been done dirty by the Yankee’s stuffy attitude towards facial hair, and I am HERE for it.
Of course, there’s no reason to panic about those hitters. Their starting rotation has always had more question marks. Gerrit Cole, of course, is one of the best pitchers in the world, and Jordan Montgomery was quietly solid. Of the various reclamation projects in the rotation, Jameson Taillon has looked good in his one start so far. On the other hand, Domingo Germán has been sent down after his dogshit pitching regressed to match his dogshit personality, and Corey Kluber hasn’t looked great against either of the Jays or the Rays in both of his starts thus far.
Taillon will look to keep the positive momentum going while Kluber will seek to finally get a handle on what was meant to be his comeback season. The offence will mostly be looking to establish some form of top-to-bottom consistency and will seek to use Robbie Ray and Ross Stripling to do so.
The Jays, on the other hand, are looking to build on the positive results in their 15-run performance against the Angels on Saturday. Lourdes Gurriel Jr. will hopefully return to the lineup soon, and the Jays’ offence hopes to build upon their momentum and have hitters not named Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette, or Randal Grichuk join in on the fun.
Robbie Ray makes his return from a flukey elbow injury and will look to prove that he can minimize his struggles with command while replicating his excellent spring training results. If the Jays want to reiterate their desire to compete for the division this year, a strong showing against the Yankees (even an early one) would go a long way towards that.
Good rundown of the series! Great job!