Thole’s departure dampens Blue Jays’ post-sweep euphoria

Josh Donaldson mashed his first career three home run game, sending the hats flying at the Rogers Centre as the Toronto Blue Jays completed the sweep over the Minnesota Twins on Canada Baseball Day with a 9-6 victory on Sunday.

R.A. Dickey moved quietly back to his locker in the Toronto Blue Jays clubhouse, shaking his head. He had just spent a few minutes in a hushed, shrug-laden conversation with Josh Thole. Kevin Pillar listened in impassively, then extended his hand to Thole and pulled him in for a quick hug.

This was the fallout of the Blue Jays much-celebrated acquisition of Dioner Navarro, the useful, switch-hitting catcher who was such an integral part of the 2015 American League East pennant. Thole had just performed his exclusive task – catching a start by knuckleballer Dickey in a 9-6 win over the Minnesota Twins in which Josh Donaldson served as a three-homer battering ram – and had packed up his equipment in a rolling bag and exited the clubhouse, a quick “I don’t know” when asked what the future held for him.

It was an oddly subdued clubhouse for a team coming off a three-game sweep, and its 29th come-from-behind victory. Or maybe it was a reflection of the quality of the opponent – possibly the worst team seen at the Rogers Centre this season. It was Donaldson’s first career three-homer game and was celebrated as a ‘hat trick,’ with fans throwing ball caps onto the field and Donaldson taking a curtain call.

Slightly less sexy, but perhaps no less telling: Jose Bautista recorded his first three-hit game of the season.

The Blue Jays face the Baltimore Orioles Monday night in the first game of a nine-game road trip to points southeast, with Navarro scheduled to join the team in Charm City. Marco Estrada is scheduled to start for the Blue Jays, and last season Navarro was his personal catcher, but when asked if he’d been told that Navarro would catch his start he just shrugged and said: “Nope. Guess we just have to stay tuned.”

The Blue Jays will make a formal move Monday to put Navarro on the roster, at which point the corresponding move will be announced. But it was expected that the Blue Jays would put Thole on waivers and hope he gets through in time to be released and then re-signed before Dickey’s next start – which is Sept. 2, one day after Major League rosters expand for the month of September. At any rate, this much was clear Sunday: Thole was not going to be on the roster for the Baltimore series.

Dickey is an acquired taste. This was his 13th quality start and his third in five, but you couldn’t tell by the grumbling in the sell-out crowd of 47,444. Dickey gave up four runs in the fifth inning, Dickeying his way to a couple of walks, a wild pitch and a passed ball. The Blue Jays came to the plate in the bottom of the inning trailing 5-1 – Donaldson’s first homer in the third inning tied the score – and pulled two runs back quickly on Troy Tulowitzki’s 22nd homer and a run-scoring single by Devon Travis.

Donaldson homered again in the seventh (a two-run blast) and the eighth (a solo shot) while Melvin Upton, Jr., contributed a crucial two-run double, also in the seventh, off Twins reliever J.T. Chargois.

Scott Feldman (7-4) picked up the win, getting a seventh-inning double play on four pitches. The Blue Jays are now 74-56 – season-high 18 games over .500 – and setting the pace in the AL East. They scored at least eight runs in three games for the first time since Sept. 11-12, 2015, including a double-header win at Yankee Stadium.

It was almost a year to the day that Edwin Encarnacion slugged three homers at the Rogers Centre and was also celebrated by hat tossing. This time, Encarnacion was on the on-deck circle, grinning as Donaldson came out for the curtain call. The day did not start out providentially for Donaldson, who drove a sinker by Twins starter Kyle Gibson off the outside of his right knee and was charged with an error in the third inning after nearly air-mailing a throw to first base in Kurt Suzuki’s ground ball for the first out of the inning.

Donaldson was in obvious pain, saying it felt as if he’d been “shot” in the knee – prefacing his comment by saying “obviously, I’ve never been shot before, but …” The point was made.

“It hurt pretty bad,” said Donaldson, whose knee was still heavily taped after the game. “It was hard to stand on it in the beginning. But in between at-bats, we were able to stay on top of it. We (the training staff) were able to do some things to keep the muscle active and loose.”

Manager John Gibbons said he gave Donaldson the option of leaving the game at any time. Donaldson just shrugged. “I don’t want to not be in the lineup,” he said. “If I can stand on it and be effective, I’ll play.”

Said Gibbons: “Very rarely do you see a guy get hit that high up. When it does happen, it’s usually not very good.”

Donaldson has now reached safely in 23 of his last 24 starts. It was the 41st time in his Blue Jays career that he’d homered to either tie the game or give his team the lead. Donaldson has 14 games with three or more RBIs this season, second in the Major Leagues to Nolan Arenado of the Colorado Rockies, who has 15.

“Doesn’t get any better than that,” Gibbons said of his third baseman. “He’s heating up. At the beginning of the homestand, he was just missing pitches; he had a couple of breaking balls that he just skied.”

It was a buckle-up kind of series that sets the stage for another September of meaningful baseball in Toronto. Thole’s status is simply a neat, little, subplot – what if the Boston Red Sox claim him to screw with the Blue Jays, or maybe use him for depth considering that their own knuckleballer, Steven Wright, has a definite chance to be on the post-season roster? If Thole is claimed, who, then, draws the short straw and catches Dickey in September?

This much is clear: if Sunday’s game was a harbinger of what Bautista and Donaldson have in store, it won’t much matter.

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