Much as he did a year earlier when his team agonizingly missed the playoffs by one game, Vlad Guerrero Jr. was front and centre at the baseball funeral that unfolded Saturday evening at the Rogers Centre.
Subtle dig from a frustrated superstar? Perhaps. Frustration in the moment of disappointment and a screeching end to a season with such high expectations? More likely.
And with that dissatisfaction comes dissection.
Of general manager Ross Atkins’ work at the trade deadline, that ended up not being enough to greatly enhance the team’s chances.
Of manager John Schneider for some of the in-game decisions, though we’re of the mind that with an 8-1 lead there was no move from the dugout that truly cost the Jays a game that was that well in hand. Put it more explicitly on that point: A team that had a seven-run lead with just 10 outs to get there should have been able to take care of business.
The Jays’ 10-9 loss to the Mariners on Saturday at the Rogers Centre certainly was the trigger point for an off-season of scrutiny, not merely for what happened over the four hours and 13 minutes it took to complete one of the greatest post-season disasters for a Toronto pro sports team.
And Schneider acknowledged that it will be difficult not to look at multiple moments of Saturday’s drama from the fifth inning and beyond.
“I thought it sequenced out pretty well,” Schneider said when asked to explain his bullpen use after removing Kevin Gausman from a game after 5.2 innings of brilliant starter’s work. “Tiimmy Mayza is a tough guy to get underneath and hit the ball out of the ball
That Schneider even mentioned the thought of second-guessing means you know that it’s already begun. He’ll shake off the lingering effects of the devastating loss eventually, but not over the first few days of an off-season that arrived too early.
Running through some of them, here are our thoughts on the in-game moves of consequence:
- Lifting Gausman after 5.2 innings was a matchup-based decision and one made easier by the fact that the starter had loaded the bases. Did Gausman pitch well enough to get a shot at finishing the inning? Perhaps. Was Mayza the right call in the situation. Probably. The southpaw’s worst mistake was the wild pitch that scored a run. The one in which he allowed a three-run homer to Carlos Santana was a good hitter winning the battle against a good pitcher.
- Anthony Bass was the biggest liability in the bullpen on the day and things truly began to unravel under his watch. But Bass had been mostly money since he came over at the trade deadline and, as Schneider suggested, fit in the sequence. His struggles forced the early call for Romano and things truly unravelled as a result.
- Perhaps the biggest decision of consequence was one that wasn’t made at all. Moving Jackie Bradley Jr., into centre field in the late innings and shuffling George Springer over to left would have had, in the precision of hindsight, immense benefits.
“We talked about getting incrementally better,” Schneider said. “And it starts in spring training.”
As is always the case with a young team, the off-season will be important, especially as another year with a high-end core in place disappeared so meekly.
“We need to make the best of these opportunities,” Guerrero said. ‘We’ll work very hard, come back stronger next year and then we’ll see what happens.”
