Blue Jays drop decision to Tigers in first game back after All-Star Game

Bo Bichette forced from game aggravating right calf injury

On Friday at Rogers Centre, the Blue Jays resumed what has been a disappointing ’24 season with a 5-4 loss to the Tigers. Measured on its own with its long-term implications, the loss seems devastating, given the overall record of 44-53. But there were no regrettable gaffes or bad decisions leading to the loss. They were just beat.

Starter Chris Bassitt threw 95 pitches and made two mistakes over 6.2 innings, both resulting in home runs, while Vlad Guerrero Jr. and George Springer slammed two-run homers, with Vlad’s blast to left leaving the yard at 117.5 mph, his second-hardest hit ball of the year, that smashed lights on an auxiliary scoreboard in left field.

“We were one swing away from winning it,” manager John Schneider opined of a rally in the eight that had the tying run at second base with one out. “The home run there to (Wenceel) Perez puts us into a little bit of a hole, but you bounce back. The bullpen did a really, really good job I thought. Between those things you look at it and you go, okay, we got beat tonight, but there was a lot of good things.”

The worst news of the night for the Jays came on a line drive out to right field by Bo Bichette who broke out of the batter’s box and came up lame, limping visibly towards first base, re-injuring his right calf that had kept him out of the lineup for a week. He will have an MRI on Saturday. It likely takes him off the table for trade speculation.

But time waits for no team and the Jays are down to 65 games remaining. Even though Bassitt maintained in the post-game that the Jays goal is still to make the playoffs, maybe it’s time to move the goalposts and lower the bar.

The Jays need to start a surge by winning a game and then turning it into a streak. With the trade deadline just 11 days away, at this point, even the most optimistic and realistic fan thoughts of reaching a wildcard spot are slipping away. Maybe Schneider should set his sights on .500. The Jays chances of reaching the post-season, according to most gambling websites, that are in the business of predicting such things, has dropped to about 2%, the level of whole milk in some refrigerators.

“I’m not going to give up hope, even if you’re drinking skim milk,” Schneider said.  “You’re not giving up hope. You’ve got to get to Point A before you get to Point B, so, yeah, you want to get to (.500) and continue to go from there. It’s going to take everyone performing up to their level of expectation and that includes guys in the bullpen, starters, hitters. But, yeah, you’ve got to get something before you start attacking something else.”

The Jays’ bullpen was solid on Friday, but, by and large, has been a huge disappointment, after breaking camp in late March, with optimism and 4-5 pitchers that seemed capable of being reliable in high-leverage situations. But injury and contra-performances have left the latter innings in tatters and far too often the weakest link on any day among Jays relievers has determined the decision.

“I think it’s allowed us to not be as consistent as we would have hoped,” Schneider said, using a masterful turn of the double-negative. “A lot of the (negative) attention goes to our offence, early (in the season), rightfully so.

“But when you lose four of your leverage arms, either at the same time, or sporadically throughout the year, it’s tough to backfill that. That’s led to some close games that you’re on the wrong end of, or not able to get on a consistent roll in terms of wins and losses. You miss Jordan (Romano), Chad (Green)for a period, Yimi (Garcia) for a period, Swanny (Erik Swanson), not getting what we had hoped for out of (Tim) Mayza, all of that happening has been tough.”

But on Friday, the Jays shuffled the deck chairs, recalling Swanson and activating Garcia, sending lefty Brandon Eisert (before the break) and righthander Zach Pop to Triple-A Buffalo. It now remains to be seen if Garcia, coming off of elbow ulnar neuritis can be as dominant as he was early in the year, also, if Swanson can return to the form that prompted the Jays to ship Teoscar Hernandez to Seattle. The manager suggested that for the time being, in the absence of Romano and maybe for the rest of this season, that Yimi and Chad Green are likely to share the role of closer. As for the head-scratching moon-walk to mediocrity of Swanson…

“I think Swanny’s in a better spot with his command,” Schneider said, with an undercurrent of hope regarding his still-struggling reliever. “I don’t think he’s Greg Maddux, by any means (in command), but things that we wanted him to be better at in terms of split and fastball definitely has gotten to the point where we think he can help us. Excited to have him back and hopefully he’s close to the Swanny that we’ve known since we acquired him.”

The Swanson numbers in the minor leagues, do not support the manager’s optimism. In 19 appearances at AAA-Buffalo and the Complex League, Swanson was 1-1, with a 10.70 ERA, yielding 28 hits, 13 walks and seven home runs in 17.2 innings. All Schneider can do is put him in low leverage situations, to begin, and hope for the best.

“We know he had some rough ones at the start and kind of throughout his time (in Buffalo),” Schneider admitted. “But looking at exactly where the pitches were, gave us a little bit of momentum to get to this point. Hopefully you can put him into spots where he has a little bit of wiggle room and work his way back up to pitching 7^th, 8^th, 9^th inning. Hopefully we see the pitcher we’ve known for a while and go from there.”

The Jays play the Tigers on Saturday and Sunday without seeing their ace Tarik Skubal, as Detroit is saving their ace for a series vs. the Guardians. So, does manager Schneider feel disrespected by A.J. Hinch for holding back their best after the break?

“I’m glad we’re not facing him,” Schneider shrugged. “He’s good. You look at their division, their standing and I can see why they did that. Not insulted a bit.”

Injury News:

In addition to Bichette’s recurring right calf injury, sometime later this week, No. 1 prospect LH Ricky Tiedemann will visit a specialist for a second opinion on his oft-ailing elbow. Isiah Kiner-Falefa on Friday began baseball activities, taking groundballs and swinging the bat.

Continuing on with the theme of the Jays having no luck when it comes to injury, 1B/DH Joey Votto was promoted from A-Dunedin to AAA-Buffalo on Friday. He was inserted into the lineup by Bisons’ manager Casey Candaele, but before the game, Votto tweaked his ankle and was scratched. Recall it was the same ankle that cost him all of spring training, after homering on his only at-bat in a split-squad game vs. the Phillies and stepping on a loose bat in the dugout.