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SIMMONS: Pathetic Jays out-manage themselves in embarrassing playoff defeat
What an embarrassing ending it was for the disappointing Blue Jays. Sad and pathetic, really. A game and a wild-card series given up on by a management group trying to pre-determine the outcome of sport, rather than allowing the professional athletes involved to do what they are well-paid to accomplish. Instead, club president Mark Shapiro, general manager Ross Atkins, the Blue Jays computers and the far too agreeable manager, John Schneider, wore the game-defeating uniforms, allowing this series and the season to disappear in 18 quick innings, in a span of analytic defeat, mental errors on the base path, without much hitting or many runs scored and a series that should now bring into question everything and everyone tied to this current edition of the Jays. To lose naturally, if that’s going to happen, is understandable. Every team loses in every conceivable way. To lose in a pre-determined way, before there was any score, is almost all that is wrong with sport and certainly with baseball today. “You can second-guess me,” said manager Schneider. “You can second-guess the organization, I get that. It’s tough. It didn’t work out for us today or yesterday.” And they will be second-guessed. Today. Tomorrow. In the months after this. In the days until club chairman Edward Rogers determines what the future of Shapiro and Atkins is, determines if he’s willing to throw family money at those who are philosophical defeatists with one of baseball’s largest payrolls. Rogers, the chairman, is normally quite invisible about everything to do with the Jays, but now it’s time to say something or do something — time for him to decide if this is the kind of baseball, the play-not-to-lose game, that he wants to be associated with. The Jays didn’t play to beat the Minnesota Twins on Wednesday afternoon. They played not to lose — and they played to outsmart the team that outsmarted them. And in the words of broadcaster Buck Martinez, who said this before the almost unexplainable pitching moves made early by Toronto, if the Jays lose Wednesday “the whole season will be a disaster.” It was, in fact, more than that. It was self-imposed defeat. The worst kind of losses. Jose Berrios returned to Minnesota on Wednesday afternoon where he once pitched so well for the Twins and may have thrown his greatest start as a Jay. He might have, had he been given any opportunity to pitch beyond the first batter in the fourth inning. Schneider said after the game he’d never seen him with better stuff. He said that with a straight face knowing he pulled him way too early, knowing the Jays lost 2-0 in the game and in the series because of that. Schneider had a chance to show large stones and say screw it to the pre-game plans as they unfolded, when Berrios was throwing the way he was. But he gave in to pre-determination to the Jays were beaten by that and other errors of thought and deed. Berrios faced just 12 batters, gave up three hits, struck out five, walked one and looked unbeatable. And he was taken out — not because there was reason to take him out. He was taken out because that was decided before a single pitch had been thrown. By those who don’t throw any pitches. Berrios knew there was no reason to pull him, especially for lefty Yusei Kikuchi, who was warming up almost from the minute the game began. He knew the plan. The Twins knew what he was throwing. Who knows what happens if Berrios stays in the game? Who knows if the Twins solve him in any way, at all? Somewhere, an algorithm and a bunch of agreeable eggheads pre-decided to pull Berrios after he walked Game 1 home run hero Royce Lewis to begin the fourth inning. Kikuchi gave up a single to the first batter he faced. He walked the second. He gave up a hit to the third batter. A double-play ball meant the Twins led 2-0 in the fourth inning. The game would end 2-0. The series would end 2-0. There’s a lot of nothing in all of that. The Jays scored one run in 18 innings against the Twins. They scored one run while getting thrown out at home in Game 1, while Vladimir Guerrero Jr., got himself picked off second base in the fifth inning of Game 2, another piece of playoff embarrassment. The Jays lost because they didn’t hit, they didn’t give themselves a chance to score, but mostly because the wrong pitcher threw at the wrong time. Now there are all kinds of questions that need answering. We needed to know before the playoffs why this team couldn’t hit for power or score runs. That was going on all season long. That was who they were. But the one thing they could do was pitch. And in trying desperately to be the smartest kids in the class, not the best athletes, not the best ball players, they outsmarted themselves. “The way the game is played today, there are a lot of numbers involved,” said Schneider. “It’s not cut and dried every single day. You have to try and take your best chance every single time.” How removing the best pitcher in the game is taking your best chance is a mystery that remains unexplained. Much like this Blue Jays season. A season of promise now nothing more than another opportunity lost. That’s four straight playoff losses for manager Schneider. That’s six straight for Shapiro, Atkins, Bo Bichette and Guerrero. Maybe the Jays need to fire their computer. The damn thing can’t win a game when it matters most. [email protected] twitter.com/simmonssteve
Publish Date : 2023-10-05 00:54:27
Image and News Source : torontosun
