ANOTHER FINE DAY
Encarnacion helps propel Jays to their third straight victory
Edwin Encarnacion, right, celebrates his game-winning hit in the bottom of the ninth at the Rogers Centre on Sunday. The Jays beat the Yankees 4-3.
Speed, steals, bunts and itsy-bitsy baseball.
This was no more recognizable with the Blue Jays, as managed by John Gibbons, than if the skipper had suddenly undergone gender reassignment surgery. Toronto can indeed swing both ways, turns out. A wee opposite-way, perfectly placed single by Edwin Encarnacion in the bottom of the ninth and the Jays walked off a 4-3 win over the Yankees for their third consecutive victory of the weekend. Cue the mob scene for Double-E and Kevin Pillar, delivered across the dish.
Did we mention a blown save for closer Roberto Osuna that turned into a presto W?
Scarcely glancing towards the dugout was Ezequiel Carrera, whose unilateral decision it had been to lay down a bunt — safety not suicide — with Melvin Upton Jr. like a tuning fork at third, scampering towards the plate with the tying run.
Upton had gone first to third on a Pillar single through the hole at second. “I was going the whole time,” said Upton, of dashing from first to third on the bunt. “I knew he had to make a perfect throw so I was just trying to be aggressive right there and get to third base.’’
He figured Carrera might then bunt. “Once I saw it down, I made a pretty good break for it.”
Carrera’s gambit unfolded as a hit and an RBI and a simultaneous error by reliever Tyler Clippard, who was burned late for the second straight game. Carrera reached second when Clippard opted to field the bunt and flipped home messily, a poor decision to gamble against the fleet-footed Upton rather than take the easier out at first. Pillar advanced to third on the error with nobody out.
Hitting just .156 entering Sunday’s game and one of the few Jays who’s an accomplished bunter — six successful on the season — Carrera had his mind well made up as he stepped into the box, with zero input from the manager.
“You never go for a squeeze with no outs,” said Gibbons afterward, which is why Upton wasn’t already running on the pitch. “Too many bad things can happen.’’
Lord knows the bad stuff had piled up lately for Toronto. But Carrera was thinking outside the box.
“It was not coming from the manager. It was from me. I just anticipated it, the play. I wanted to do it and I wanted to do it on the first pitch, so I did it.” A splitter, it was. “It’s part of my game. I know I can control my bat and I’m good at it and I have to take advantage of that,” Carrera explained. “So every time I have the chance to do it I make sure I do it right.’’
If without consultation from the bench, which is rather nervy. All’s well that ends well, of course, though Carrera, for one, would like to see more strategy that doesn’t rely so heavily on the long ball and power.
“It’s always good to change the rhythm of the game. I don’t think other teams are waiting for that.’’
Certainly Clippard was caught flat-footed and dim-witted.
The right-hander entered with one on in the ninth, after New York had scored twice in the top of the inning, getting to Osuna quickly on a couple of line drives and a sacrifice fly, drawing even and then nudging ahead 3-2. In olden days of Jays, the situation would not have seemed so dire, trailing by only one run at home in the ninth.
But these hitting-constipated Jays aren’t quite those Jays anymore. They’d left the bases loaded in the sixth and seventh, with their only run against Yankee starter Michael Pineda a fourth inning jack by Jose Bautista, his 21st and his second homer in two games. Otherwise, Pineda had held Toronto to three hits through 52⁄ innings before
3 Adam Warren was summoned. Warren handed off to closer Dellin Betances, who walked Josh Donaldson in the eighth, then surrendered an RBI single to Bautista up the middle, Jays up 2-1.
In the ninth, Betances issued another leadoff walk, to Upton. With Clippard assuming the pitching reins, looking for redemption and the save, Pillar battled through a gritty at-bat, lining one the other way, Upton galloping to third.
It was smart, heads-up baseball for the Jays, set in motion by Upton working an 0-2 count into a walk.
“To fall behind on Betances, that’s not easy,” noted Gibbons. “Melvin, he’s a free swinger. But a great atbat. Then Kevin got two strikes, coming back and getting a big hit.”
Encarnacion was 1-for-4 when he came to the plate in the ninth, two runners on and many anticipating a typical Encarnacion swat. Instead, with the infield playing back, he stroked the first offering from Clippard, an 82 m.p.h. splitter to the right side of second baseman Ronald Torreyes.
“In that situation, you don’t try to do too much,” Encarnacion said. “When you try to do too much, that don’t happen. I just tried to stick to the middle and put that ball in play.”
Toronto benefitted from a splendid seven-inning performance from Marco Estrada, who’s only mistake was a changeup that stayed up and juicy for Didi Gregorius, a solo shot over the right field wall in the seventh.
But Estrada escaped further damage, with two on, by striking out Torreyes to end the inning and Joaquin Benoit handling the eighth.
“Great game today,” Estrada said. “Well-played baseball. We bunted a few times, which was huge . . . We don’t always need a homer to win these games, so it was kind of fun to watch.’’
The Jays quite liked what they saw and — in maintaining their 11⁄ 2- game lead over Baltimore for the first wild-card spot while extending their distance from Detroit to three games — altogether have loved putting a hurt on New York in this series, which concludes Monday. It was a Gotham sweep at Yankee Stadium early this month that flung the Jays into their September funk. Funk you too.