In battle of inept offences, Tampa Bay Rays beat Blue Jays

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Published Jul 23, 2024  •  Last updated 7 hours ago  •  4 minute read

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For two teams as offensively challenged as the Blue Jays and Tampa Bay Rays, Tuesday’s outcome was about what one would expect.

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Neither club has a player dominating the offensive stats, although in Toronto’s case, George Springer has been pretty good for the past month or so while Vladimir Guerrero Jr. has rebounded from a truly woeful April.

Tampa has got some power out of both first baseman Isaac Paredes and outfielder Randy Arozarena but nothing consistently.

And both teams rank closer to 30th or dead last in most of the major offensive stat categories than to anything close to single digits in ranking.

But on a night where Tampa was without a traditional starting pitcher, choosing the opener and a slew of bullpen arms to get them through an open spot in the rotation and the Jays starter Jose Berrios, following a stellar 10-pitch first inning, was life and death to find the strike zone, there was at least realistic hope for some actual offence.

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It still didn’t help either side much with Tampa somehow pushing across four runs on the night for a 4-2 win despite having just two extra base hits all evening.

The 38,575 paying customers had numerous reasons to complain about the lack of bang for their buck. At least they had Loonie Dogs night to keep things remotely palatable.

Berrios did his best to contribute to Tampa’s chances with six walks over the 42/3 innings he remained in the game.

Still, Tampa managed to turn that into just three runs as it could sandwich just three hits around those six walks.

The Jays right-hander had reeled off four wins to begin the year over his first five starts but is now just 4-8 since in his past 16.

Perhaps factoring into last night’s control issues were the 10 days between starts the all-star game and break created for Berrios. Often times too much rest between starts can be as detrimental as too little and in this situation, that appeared to be the case.

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Berrios admitted after the game the long stint between starts was on his mind.

Manager John Schneider seemed as surprised as anyone with the number of free passes his starter issued even though Berrios did issue a then season-high four walks in his last start before the break.

“I don’t think it was similar to last time,” Schneider said. “He still had a handful of strikeouts. I thought he came out with really good stuff. He had a good fastball and then he kind of just lost the zone. It was really unlike him. I felt it was different just because he was getting swing and miss and the changeup was good. The breaking ball was alright. It was just kind of a weird outing for him.”

Toronto’s own tepid offence was held in check by opener Shawn Armstrong and bulk reliever Tyler Alexander over the first five innings.

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Armstrong got the Rays through the first two frames without a blemish on the scorecard while Alexander would give them three more scoreless to earn the win.

The bulk of that lead evaporated on back-to-back at bats by the Jays in the sixth when first Guerrero connected off Manuel Rodriguez for his 17th home run of the year and was immediately followed by Justin Turner who knocked his sixth out of the park.

Rodriguez got through the rest of the inning without further damage but the Jays were back within a run.

Those back-to-back home runs by the Jays were the lone semblance of offence they would muster all game.

Toronto would settle for four hits on the night while the victorious Rays needed just six of their own to put one in the win column.

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Springer, who has been one of the most productive hitters in the Majors the past month had a rough night with an 0-for-4 that included three strikeouts.

Guerrero had just the one hit, the home run but hit a number of balls hard right at defenders.

The home run was his third of the homestand already. On a team hard-pressed to entertain with the bats, his at bats of late have been the one’s Jays fans can’t afford to miss.

“It’s fun to watch him right now really,” Schneider said of his first baseman slugger. “It’s fun to talk to him with his plan going in. When you combine his talent, being confident, seeing results and sticking with a routine, he’s dangerous every single pitch he’s looking at. Fun to watch him right now for sure.”

Three more relievers from that Tampa bullpen all contributed a scoreless inning following that outburst against Rodriguez to put to rest any thoughts of a Blue Jays comeback.

Pete Fairbanks closed it out with his 19th save of the year.

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mgnater@postmedia.com

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