BOSTON — A familiar story unfolded for the Toronto Blue Jays at Fenway Park Friday night.
Solid pitching. Some offence – not enough. Poor defence. Frustrating loss. Playoff odds drop.
This time, there were new twists such as a ball bouncing off Yohendrick Piñango’s back in left field and the first big-league loss for rookie CJ Van Eyk. But the end result was familiar: frustration.
Along the way, there were positives: nine strikeouts from Trey Yesavage, a big night from Nathan Lukes and a historic swing from Kazuma Okamoto, but the time for silver linings is April, or maybe May. It’s certainly not late July.
Under those circumstances, the Blue Jays’ 6-4 loss to the Boston Red Sox was a costly one. They’re now 10 games below .500 and 7.0 games behind the streaking Red Sox for the final American League wild-card spot.
No one needs their playoff odds to confirm the obvious, anymore: they’re in deep trouble. Reaching the trade deadline at .500 is now an impossibility. Even an eight-game win streak would leave them two games under on Aug. 3.
With each loss, the likelihood of a summer sell-off increases. And while some players prefer to avoid discussing the topic, they’re all aware of what might be coming.
That’s still more than a week away, though. Here in Boston, the Blue Jays turned to Van Eyk in high leverage since relievers Louis Varland and Tyler Rogers both appeared to be down after pitching twice in a row against the Tampa Bay Rays. Of the five hitters Van Eyk faced, four reached and two scored.
Earlier in the game, the Blue Jays rallied when Okamoto hit a three-run home run over the centre-field wall. The third baseman had been struggling of late before breaking out with a double and the long home run.
Not only did the homer pull the Blue Jays back to within one, it gave Okamoto 23 on the season, passing Shohei Ohtani for the most homers ever hit by a Japanese rookie.
Otherwise, it was a quiet night for Blue Jays hitters, though Vladimir Guerrero Jr. had two hits and Daulton Varsho had three.
Aside from Okamoto, it was Lukes who had the biggest night among Blue Jays position players. Soon after entering the game as a pinch hitter in the sixth inning, he threw out Caleb Durbin trying to score. Two innings later, he hit a leadoff double and scored the game’s tying run.
On the pitching side, Yesavage struck out nine Red Sox over four innings, but he allowed three runs, including two home runs, on five hits and one walk. Despite the short outing, the rookie generated 17 swinging strikes while topping out at 95.8 m.p.h.
On Saturday, it’ll be Dylan Cease against Sonny Gray.