Sweep ends road to nowhere for lost Jays
Happ no match for Kluber but defence opens door . . . Bautista still sees hope
CLEVELAND— The Blue Jays handed the ball to their second-best starting pitcher, J.A. Happ, trying to salvage the final game of this road trip from hell at Progressive Field on Sunday.
But after a four-run Cleveland first inning and with right-hander Corey Kluber on the hill for the Indians, it felt like this game was over. In fact, it was.
The 8-1 loss completed a threegame sweep, and even though Happ was not hit hard in the first, when half the Cleveland runs were scored, the Jays’ infield defence was shaky — including a bunt hit with nobody covering first base.
The big blow in the first was a threerun double by Brandon Guyer. Six of Guyer’s 10 RBIs for the season have come in his two games vs. the Jays.
“The line’s the line and I’m responsible for that,” Happ said. “I need to get better results. If you dig into it, I think (there were) two hard-hit balls. And before the (Michael Brantley) home run in the sixth, overall, I was still feeling pretty good about how I was throwing the ball, getting softer contact and pitching all right.
“Again, what matters is the line, and I didn’t keep us close enough today.”
Happ allowed a season-high seven runs and his four first-inning runs matched the total he had given up in the opening frame through 12 starts.
The Jays looked lost at the plate and in the field, but the quality of Kluber’s pitches had much to do with that. The 2014 Cy Young winner struck out 14 in 72⁄ innings. He’s 19-1 with a
3 1.50 ERA in starts with 10-plus Ks.
The only offensive highlight for the Jays was a 451-foot home run halfway up the bleachers in left field by Kevin Pillar. The rest was dismal.
Right fielder Jose Bautista is the longest serving Blue Jay. He’s been through the bad and the good. He was asked if this compares to the feel of the 2013 season — great expectations that turned to dust with injuries and bad play.
“We’ll see,” Bautista said. “At the end of the year will be a better moment to determine that. I’m still confident that we can play better than we have, and when we do that we’ll be right in the thick of things. After that happens it’s just going to be a fight for the division lead. We have plenty of division games left. We just have to play better from here on out and we’ll be right in the middle of things.”
The optimism of the players and manager inside the clubhouse had head-shakingly little to do with the reality of what happened on the field in Cleveland.
“I think if we just focus pitch-by-pitch, day-by-day, inning-by-inning, one day at a time,” Bautista said. “It sounds cliché, but it’s the easiest way to deal with it as a player. We have come back from similar situations the last two years and made it to the playoffs — maybe not as deep a hole as we are in right now, but from not being in the division lead, it’s not out of reach. Ten games or so in two months is not the easiest thing to overcome, but it’s not impossible.”
Bautista was asked if it would help if the Jays added talent to the roster by the July 31 trade deadline, which then-GM Alex Anthopoulos did not do in 2014 and then did in 2015.
“I feel confident about the group that we have,” Bautista said. “I think we can make some special things happen from now until the end of the season, but a shot in the arm never hurts anybody. That being said . . we believe in each other just like we did in spring training, and we’re looking forward to the challenge.”
The Jays’ challenge with this group looms larger and larger every day.