JAYS BUSY STITCHING PATCHWORK PITCHING PLAN FOR PLAYOFFS
Can Montoyo's young staff bounce back after being pounded by Yankees?
Given what we've already seen from the resilient Toronto Blue Jays, it wouldn't be a surprise if they swat aside the stench of three straight blowout losses in the Bronx.
Likewise, it wouldn't be a stunner if the young team finds its stride on offence again, especially with Teoscar Hernandez back in the lineup and Lourdes Gurriel Jr. crushing seemingly every pitch he sees.
But just how they're going to get enough outs to be competitive when the post-season arrives in less than two weeks is much less certain.
The unsightly pitching disaster at Yankee Stadium this week was the confluence of a number of factors, but three-alarm material whichever way you dissect it.
At present, the starting rotation contains at best two arms that you would want to face one of the top seeds in the American League.
The luxury, if you want to think of it in such terms with a team that's dropped three in a row and five of its past seven, is that there are no legitimate pursuers for the bottom seeds in the American League. The Jays were dinged for 43 runs over three nasty nights and essentially gave up no ground.
Clearly, the post-season won't go past two or three games if things aren't sorted out in a hurry, however. And that starts with the starters, where Hyunjin Ryu remains at the top of the rotation. But then what?
Left in the carnage of what unfolded at Yankee Stadium, a record-setting barrage of home runs the likes of which has literally never been seen in MLB, is a pitching corps under duress. And with the playoffs on the horizon, the Jays front office, along with manager Charlie Montoyo and pitching coach Pete Walker, will have to forge a plan on how to proceed.
The options are as unclear at this point as they may seem unattractive. But the reality is that the team has been stitching together its starting pitching plan since the beginning of the 60-game season.
With Ryu starting in Philadelphia on Saturday, he projects nicely to start the post-season opener on Sept. 29. Taijuan Walker, despite getting yanked without getting out of the second inning on Tuesday, is the clear No. 2 choice. Though Walker was the starter in that 20-6 debacle in the Bronx on Tuesday, it all unravelled after another of right fielder Derek Fisher's ongoing disasters and the effort can arguably be tossed as a result.
Beyond Ryu and Walker, the choices likely will be made by what unfolds over the next handful of days.
Robbie Ray and Ross Stripling — the scheduled starters for Friday's doubleheader in Philadelphia — are two candidates. The lefty Ray has shown some improvement since being acquired from the Arizona Diamondbacks, while Stripling
shapes up more as a long reliever.
Tanner Roark and Chase Anderson are in the starting mix, as well. But after both of them were destroyed by the Yankees — including Anderson's historic five homers allowed in one inning on Thursday — the Jays at least will be exploring other solutions.
Julian Merryweather was one of those options as an opener — and still could be — though he, too, struggled in his one inning of work on Thursday. And the imminent return of Matt Shoemaker and Nate Pearson could be a factor, though not likely as pure starters.
None of this mayhem can come as a huge surprise, of course. When Pearson and Shoemaker went down with injuries, it became a nightly task for Montoyo to stitch together a plan to cover nine innings on the mound. And there's a reason general manager Ross Atkins acquired three potential starters at the trade deadline — Walker,
Ray and Stripling.
The Jays still haven't had a starter go into the seventh inning, a development that has garnered considerable criticism, must publicly from Roark. But the strategy was a partially calculated move by the front office that strayed from the traditional approach to handle a 60-game schedule as opposed to 162 and to take advantage of the opportunities of a 28-man roster.
The Jays' brain trust believed that exceptional circumstances — and a perilously crammed schedule — required creativity. So the onus was placed on a bullpen that rose to the challenge and arguably was the prime reason the Jays rocketed into playoff contention. From Jordan Romano to Ryan Borucki, A.J. Cole, Anthony Key, Anthony Bass, Merryweather and more, the hard-throwing group has been money.
But the relievers have needed some relief of their own of late.
Closer Ken Giles is gone for the season after just two games back. Romano, who had been sensational, is still on the injury list. And a handful of others have been operating on fumes.
Just how the team can get 27 outs a night was a potential issue from the start of the season. but it's a dire situation now. After one more turn through the rotation, it will be time for Montoyo and Walker to stitch together a strategy for the first three days of the playoffs.
Maybe lefty Ray will step up. Maybe the opener strategy will work out. And maybe Ryu and Walker will provide a formidable enough one-two punch at the front end that it won't matter.
However it unfolds, we're about to find out if the Jays are facing a pitching crisis that could lead to an early playoff exit, or if an extraordinary season of resiliency yields another successful response.