STAYING AT ARM’S LENGTH
Steve Pearce keeps his distance at the plate, but Rays keep their distance in the standings
It was a tough night for Blue Jays starter Marco Estrada, whose cellphone likely blew up in the afternoon over trade rumours as surely his defence blew up at night. The bottom line was that the Jays lost 6-4 to the Rays on Tuesday at Rogers Centre.
The Jays had a chance to pull even with the Rays in the AL East and wild-card standings, but played poorly and let the game get away. The teams play two more games in the series to end the Jays 10-game homestand.
Estrada wants to be in the Blue Jays uniform, but was admittedly distracted by trade rumours leading up to the deadline at the end of July. On Tuesday, there was a report the 34year-old veteran had been claimed off revocable waivers by an unknown team. Another distraction.
Estrada was far from blameless in this Jays stinker. He allowed a tworun homer to Rays first baseman Lucas Duda with one out in the third inning, and a leadoff blast to catcher Wilson Ramos in the fourth that gave the Rays a 3-1 lead.
But Estrada needs his defence in order to be successful and it deserted him.
Former Jays shortstop Adeiny Hechavarria lifted a high flyball down the right field foul line in the fourth inning that Jose Bautista, Justin Smoak and Rob Refsnyder all lumbered towards with the ball finding a soft landing spot for a double. Later in the inning, Corey Dickerson stole second as Refsnyder shied away and let the ball scurry out into centre field for a Mike Ohlman error.
In the fifth inning, with the first two runners on base, Refsnyder caught a line drive then inexplicably hesitated with the flip for the easy double play, finally feeding it toward the face of shortstop Darwin Barney. There was no error charged.
The next batter, Ramos, lifted a high flyball to centre field with the roof open. Kevin Pillar did not see it as he spread his hands in frustration. It dropped in to load the bases. A discombobulated Estrada then walked two Rays.
It ended a streak of three consecutive quality starts for Estrada and four straight good starts over which he had posted a 2.08 ERA in 26 innings.
But luckily for Jays’ fans, the resurgence of third baseman Josh Donaldson continued, as he slammed a three-run homer off Rays starter Blake Snell in the fifth inning to narrow the deficit to two runs. Donaldson has contributed nine homers in his past 17 games. In fact, among his past 17 hits, the Bringer of Rain has three doubles and eight home runs.
But Donaldson’s homer was pretty much the last bit of life from the Jays offence Tuesday.
They managed just one hit over the final four innings, a Donaldson single in the seventh off Tampa Bay reliever Steve Cishek. The Jays went meekly in the ninth — strikeout, strikeout, comebacker to the mound — as Rays closer Alex Colome picked up his 35th save.
Both organizations have prided themselves on solid defence over the past several years, but neither team executed on this night.
The Jays opened the scoring in the second when, with Steve Pearce on first base, Pillar looped a hit to the right of straightaway centre field. Pearce hesitated at second, but the ball bounced high over Steve Souza’s head.
When centre-fielder Mallex Smith fumbled and booted the ball around, Pearce was waved around to score by coach Luis Rivera. Pillar was credited with an RBI double and no error was charged.
Rookie left-hander Tim Mayza, a 12th-round pick in the 2013 June draft by the Blue Jays, made his major-league debut, pitching a shutout ninth while allowing a pair of hits. He is the 28th pitcher used by the Jays in 2017.