BALTIMORE – Here’s the thing about all those walks Aaron Sanchez issues – he isn’t always going to be able to unleash a magic sinker that induces a double-play grounder to get him out of dodge. Make a habit of flirting with danger and eventually you’re going to get hurt.
As Toronto Blue Jays manager John Gibbons is fond of saying, walks kill you in this business.
That’s precisely what happened to Sanchez on Wednesday night in a 6-1 loss to the Baltimore Orioles, when he at times looked in control, but was ultimately undone by one wild stretch. A five-run second – set up by consecutive walks on nine pitches to open the frame – essentially ended this one before it started, with little hope for a comeback against nemesis Miguel Gonzalez.
"One inning," lamented Gibbons. "We’ve been victimized by that in this last week, 10 days. Other than that (Sanchez) was pretty good."
The Blue Jays had a chance to rally in the top of the third, but with two on and none out, Ezequiel Carrera had a brain cramp on Josh Donaldson’s chopper to third, straying too far from the bag and getting tagged out by a diving Manny Machado. That left men on first and second for Jose Bautista, who promptly hit into a 5-4-3 double play to end the inning.
They didn’t get another base-runner until the eighth inning, when Kevin Pillar walked and Ryan Goins singled to open the inning, managing a run on a passed ball when Donaldson walked. Darren O’Day took over from Gonzalez with two out to face Bautista, who hit a weak comebacker to the mound on the first pitch to end the frame.
Barring the unlikely, the game was moot by then anyway.
Chris Davis – 4-for-4 with two homers coming in versus Sanchez – walked on four pitches to open the second and J.J. Hardy followed with another base on balls to create a jam. David Lough dropped a sacrifice bunt that advanced the runners and took away the possibility of a double play, bringing up Caleb Joseph.
Erratic with his fastball location at that point, Sanchez dropped a first-pitch curveball for a strike then doubled up with another curve that Joseph looped foul down the line. Rather than changing things up, catcher Russell Martin called for a third straight curveball that Joseph hooked down the line for a two-run double that opened the scoring, and set the stage for the rest of the inning.
"That’s just what we felt," Sanchez said of tripling up on the curveball. "That’s something Russell had in his gut and I was right on page with him. It comes down to poor execution on my part."
Rey Navarro followed with a grounder to second that would have ended the inning had a better pitch been made to Joseph, but Sanchez couldn’t contain the damage after that. Machado and Alejandro De Aza followed with RBI doubles and Jimmy Paredes added a run-scoring infield single as things unravelled – Sanchez falling behind each one of them.
"In baseball you try to stay away from those big innings and I just couldn’t find a way to get it done," said Sanchez. "There were a couple of times I had guys in count leverage and I didn’t put them away."
The 22-year-old recovered from there and was solid into the sixth, leaving after a pair of two-out walks. Liam Hendriks cleaned up that mess to keep things where they were, leaving Sanchez with five earned runs on seven hits and four walks with just one strikeout – his worst pitching line of the season.
Still, Sanchez did get 11 groundouts to two flyouts, induced plenty of weak contact and showed enough to continue tantalizing the Blue Jays.
"I felt like I had good command of my changeup," said Sanchez. "Curveball wasn’t really where I wanted it, fastball command was better but I’ll take the good from this start and move on."
The extreme movement on his fastball is both a blessing and a curse, as at times it keeps him from being in the zone consistently. In time, the Blue Jays are confident he’ll learn to harness the heat. Until then, they’ll have to live with the swings, and the days when his self-made trouble can’t be escaped.