Gausman finds his form, but Blue Jays' bats smothered in west-coast opener

SEATTLE — What better time to begin a 10-day, 9-game, three-city west coast road trip than when you’re 6-13 over the prior three weeks, nine games below .500 for the first time in five years, and careening towards a July 30 trade deadline that could turn over a fifth of the clubhouse, maybe more.

Alas, that’s how the Toronto Blue Jays arrived at T-Mobile Park Friday for an annual Canadian takeover that for so many years has been a rollicking occasion, but this time around carries a rather unfortunate air.

In 2022 and ‘23, the thousands of passionate fans who make their way south from British Columbia, Alberta, as far away as Saskatchewan, were watching a playoff team. In ‘21, they watched Teoscar Hernandez and Marcus Semien hit bombs for a nomadic group that missed the post-season by a game yet was qualitatively the best Blue Jays vintage of this era.

This time? They’re witnessing a perpetually unaligned team that keeps springing a new leak just as it's plugged the last.

Early this season, the rotation let down an offence that got off to a hot start. Then, when the starters stabilized, several of Toronto’s most important hitters went cold. As the Blue Jays searched desperately for more offence, defensive compromises were made that a wearied pitching staff couldn’t overcome. Lately, just as struggling core hitters have come around, once-productive supporting players have crashed back to earth, injuries have piled up, and one of MLB’s shakiest bullpens has imploded.

Friday, it was Kevin Gausman — who pitched to a 5.65 ERA in June — looking as good as he has in five outings, striking out 10 over six innings of two-run ball; while Toronto’s offence — which had scored the fourth-most runs in the American League over the last 14 days — was smothered by Luis Castillo, who struck out 8 over 6.2 innings of one-run ball.

And it was another Blue Jays loss, 2-1, dropping the club to 10 games below .500 for the first time since the final day of a 2019 season that Toronto finished 67-95. 

“We did a good job keeping it really close throughout the game,” said Blue Jays outfielder Daulton Varsho, who was one of only three Toronto hitters to reach base. “Just couldn’t figure out how to get on top.”

Playing sliders off two-seamers to righties and changeups off four-seamers to lefties, Castillo carried a no-hitter into the sixth. Spencer Horwitz’s fourth-inning leadoff walk was the only thing keeping him from a perfect game.

But that’s when Kevin Kiermaier finally gave all those Western Canadians something to celebrate, turning on an up-and-in heater and taking it for a ride over the right field wall:

One problem — it was one of only two Blue Jays hits on the night and the only run the team scored. Horwitz singled following Kiermaier’s homer but Bo Bichette grounded into an inning-ending double play three pitches later. And all Toronto got the rest of the way against Castillo and Seattle’s bullpen was a two-out Varsho walk in the seventh.

“[Castillo] had a good fastball working. Really good mix, too. He was throwing breaking balls or changeups behind in the count and in even counts that were really located well,” Blue Jays manager John Schnedier said. “These guys pitch. They're up there with the best arms in the league. There weren't many opportunities. Castillo was really good. Their bullpen is really good. And they didn't really give us much room to work with there.”

Yes, the Mariners are used to games like these when near-flawless pitching carries underperforming bats. Seattle’s batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage are all bottom-five marks across MLB. No team has struck out in a higher percentage of its plate appearances. Entering Friday, only three Mariners regulars had an OPS above .700, led by Dylan Moore’s resounding .723.

And yet, Seattle’s pitching staff has allowed the fewest runs per game in the AL. It leads MLB in batting average against and WHIP. The club’s top four starters have all surpassed 100 innings pitched with below-league-average ERA’s. No team has more quality starts.

Couple that stellar pitching with an anemic offence and you get MLB’s leader in one-run victories. A team that’s averaged 7.58 combined runs per game over its first 89 contests — the lowest in baseball by nearly a half run. One that’s found a way to walk that tightrope to a 48-41 record and first place in the AL West.

So, don’t be surprised if the next two games of this series look a lot like Friday’s — low-scoring, nervy, played on a razor’s edge. That’s how Gausman’s night felt, as he allowed baserunners in five of his six innings, earned five of his 10 strikeouts with runners on base, and got three flyouts at the warning track. 

Gausman faced trouble from the jump, as the Mariners put two on with one out in the first. But he struck out the epically slumping Julio Rodriguez with a nasty splitter before Varsho got him out of the inning with an absurd, full-speed-into-the-wall catch-of-the-year-candidate in left-centre:

“I honestly thought it was going to be a homer right off the bat,” Varsho said. “But it hung up enough where it came kind of straight down at the same time as I was going full speed into a wall. So, I just tried to do everything I could.

“I was in a full-on sprint the whole time. So, there was nothing that I could do at that point. You just hope it goes in your glove and you take a shot at the wall. That doesn’t feel great. But you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do.”

Gausman’s defence nearly got him out of a one-on, two-out bind two innings later, when Ernie Clement made a diving stop on a 106-m.p.h. Rodriguez laser at third, and appeared to get the out by a fraction of a second across the diamond. But video review ultimately showed Clement’s throw pulling Horwitz’s right cleat just centimetres off the bag, forcing Gausman to pivot from the top of the dugout steps and continue pitching, now with two runners on.

Two pitches later, Luke Raley shot an elevated fastball into the left-centre field gap, clearing the bases. It was Seattle’s only hit off Gausman in seven opportunities with runners in scoring position. And they were the only runs he allowed all night. 

Following his last outing — a frustrating, seven-run day against the New York Yankees — Gausman tweaked his delivery, seeking to start from a more hunched-over, forward-leaning position before he comes to the plate. The idea is that will allow him to work around the strike zone with his fastball more consistently, and minimize the horizontal movement on his splitter in favour of more vertical.

“Any time you have to make a mechanical adjustment in the middle of the season is hard. But I threw a really good bullpen two days ago and I was really optimistic about it,” Gausman said. “I always say the hitters are going to let you know. And punching out the first guy to start the game definitely gave me a little bit of confidence. … You could see the swing-and-misses, the uncomfortable at-bats that you're used to seeing with me. It was nice to see those.”

Naturally, the lone pitch he’d want back was a four-seam fastball, an offering that’s been getting hammered this season. Opposition hitters have slugged .575 with a 56 per cent hard-hit rate against Gausman’s most-used pitch — both career highs. More concerning is how right-handers have teed off on it, running a 19 per cent barrel rate, up from 9.2 per cent in 2023.

Of course, Gausman’s heater is always going to be the pitch he gives up the most damage on, considering how aggressively he uses it in the strike zone — Gausman’s landed over a third of his fastballs over the heart of the plate since he entered the league — and how nasty his splitter is. He has to work in the zone to tunnel the two of them together. But that only adds importance to Gausman’s fastball velocity, which has averaged 93.8-m.p.h. this season — the second-lowest mark of his career.

The average MLB four-seamer this season is 94.2-m.p.h. If Gausman’s consistently working below that, he’s going to surrender damage. Over Gausman’s career, hitters have slugged only .383 against the fastballs he’s thrown at 95-m.p.h. or harder. Against fastballs 94-m.p.h. or softer, that number balloons to .619.

But Friday, Gausman had his good heater. He sat 95-m.p.h. with it, working up to righties and away from lefties to earn 17 of his 21 whiffs and 11 of his 18 called strikes. It tied his highest average four-seam velocity in any start this season. And the difference in the game still came off that pitch. It’s just the way Toronto’s season has gone. Plug one leak, spring another.