Martin injury hurts in series opener
Catcher out early vs. old club, Bautista hits milestone on rough night for Refsnyder
While the Blue Jays often go as Jose Bautista goes, there was no celebration on a night when the slugger reached a significant milestone at the plate.
Bautista hit the 20-homer mark for the eighth consecutive season in the opener of a three-game series — a 4-2 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates at the Rogers Centre — with a solo shot to centre field.
Only three active players have longer streaks, and just one Blue Jay has ever racked up more 20-plus seasons in a row: Carlos Delgado from1996 to 2004.
The long ball, Bautista’s third in as many games, came after a third-inning breakdown by the Jays, who coughed up a slim lead by allowing four unearned runs. The stalled Blue Jays offence saw the Pirates capitalize on a pair of errors by second baseman Rob Refsnyder — who also struck out four times — and just enough hits off Marcus Stroman, who gave the bullpen some relief by going eight innings before handing off to Danny Barnes.
The Jays suffered a potentially greater loss when catcher Russell Martin strained his left oblique during his first at-bat.
The 34-year-old ex-Pirate grimaced as he hit a ground ball and trotted slowly towards first. He hobbled back to the dugout and came out to warm up for the second inning before signaling that he couldn’t continue, with backup Raffy Lopez taking over behind the plate.
On a night when runs proved hard to come by, the Jays did open the scoring in the second — a bases-loaded sacrifice fly by Kevin Pillar cash- ing in Justin Smoak. The slumping Pillar has RBIs in back-to-back games for the first time since May.
Stroman had thrown a pair of clean innings before things got messy in the third.
With one out, Stroman hit batter John Jaso in the foot — a call upheld by video review — giving Pittsburgh its first baserunner of the night. Jaso advanced to third on Refsnyder’s first error of the game, on a grounder by Francisco Cervelli.
Jaso would score after Refsnyder’s second miscue, on a play that began with third baseman Josh Donaldson making a diving stop of an Adam Frazier liner.
The Pirates took the lead on an RBI single by Josh Harrison, before an Andrew McCutchen double and Josh Bell sacrifice fly made it 4-1 for the visitors.
McCutchen hobbled off after his hit, later diagnosed with a left knee injury, and was replaced in centre field by Starling Marte.
Bautista’s fourth homer in the last five games, after going18 games without one, narrowed the gap to 4-2 in the bottom of the third off Pirates starter Jameson Taillon, a Canadian-American dual citizen.
Stroman was efficient the rest of the way, facing no more than four batters in any of his final five innings and tying a season low by allowing just four hits on the night. The righthander’s pitch count of 109 matched his second-highest of the season, though.
Barnes picked up where Stroman left off with a 1-2-3 ninth, including a pair of strikeouts.
But the Jays couldn’t take advantage at the plate, going 2-for-7 with runners in scoring position.
Should Martin’s injury require a stint on the disabled list, he’d join catchers Miguel Montero and Luke Maile on the shelf. The Jays have used six different catchers so far this season. They have 26-year-old Mike Ohlman, who appeared in five bigleague games earlier this season, as an option at Triple-A Buffalo.