Weird and Wonderful: Blue Jays beat Red Sox again after wild finish

BOSTON — Baseball is a crazy sport. Jose Berríos was cruising right along in his fourth inning Saturday with a three-run lead. But then Masataka Yoshida chopped a pitch at his neck into left field for a 76.7-m.p.h. single before Justin Turner got jammed up-and-in yet somehow looped a 59-m.p.h. base hit into left. Three pitches later, ahead in the count, 1-2, Berrios spun a slurve at Rafael Devers’ shoelaces. It measured 11 inches from the ground. And it landed 430-feet away:

That’s Berríos’ best pitch. He entered Saturday’s outing carrying a +5 run value on his slurve, the second-highest of any season in his career after pandemic-shortened 2020. Opponents were batting just .207 against it with a .317 slugging percentage and 32 per cent whiff rate.

And that’s despite Berríos landing it off the plate nearly 60 per cent of the time. Which is no accident. Berríos has done such a good job commanding the pitch and disguising it with his fastballs that hitters have been chasing it liberally. Devers certainly did. He just somehow got his barrel to it.

Crazy sport. Consider that last season the Blue Jays went 16-3 against the Red Sox. Boat-raced them repeatedly. Won the final nine games the teams played. After dropping their first seven meetings this year, Toronto is fighting not to contend with its franchise-worst season against Boston, which came in 1977 when the Red Sox won 12 of 15.

This weekend at Fenway Park, different story. The Blue Jays won Saturday, 5-4, clinching a series victory in a wacky, madcap matinee. The ninth inning saw both teams commit outrageous baserunning gaffes, as the Blue Jays ran into a 9-3-6 double play in the top half before the Red Sox ended the game with an 8-4 one in the bottom.

“With the way the ball's been flying the last two days, you think that's off the wall at the very least. But you never underestimate the power of Kevin Kiermaier in the outfield," said Blue Jays manager John Schneider. “So, you take advantage of a baserunning mishap by Reese [McGuire.] We gave them one in the top of the ninth, too. Definitely wasn't easy. A little stressful.”

Crazy sport. Even before it starts being played. Both teams made late lineup changes prior to Saturday’s game, the Blue Jays scratching Danny Jansen due to right wrist inflammation, while the Red Sox opted not to start Alex Verdugo for undisclosed reasons.

Jansen’s issue isn’t expected to be serious as he experiences some residual effects from being hit on the forearm by a 99-m.p.h. Shintaro Fujinami fastball on Wednesday. Verdugo’s issue? Well, Red Sox manager Alex Cora opted not to elaborate on it, but did say, “I’m very disappointed — this is probably one of my worst days here in this organization.”

Crazy sport. Brandon Belt was in the middle of everything. He reached on an error trying to bunt in the first inning, homered in the third, and drove in a go-ahead run with a groundball single in the sixth. He saw 20 pitches across five plate appearances. His single and his walk both came with two strikes. And as far as he’s concerned, “that bunt was a hit.”

That’s not the first time we’ve seen Belt — Toronto’s second-slowest player per Statcast’s sprint speed — bunt recently. He tried to get one down in the ninth inning of a Detroit Tigers no-hitter a few weeks ago. On Wednesday, he went for one after getting ahead of a pitcher, 3-0. He’s gotten one down in two-strike counts four times in his career. And on three of those instances, he reached first base.

The way Belt looks at it, a bunt’s a free hit if he can execute it. Even as a 21st percentile sprint speed guy. If the infield’s back and he can lay the ball down the third-base line, he has a better chance of reaching first than if he swings trying to drive the ball. Belt can give you the percentages if you’re keen. He’s put a bunt in play 40 times since 2014 and come away with a hit on 28 occasions. He’s a .700 hitter when he gets it down.

Crazy sport. Take Friday, when the Blue Jays won the first game of this series with a seven-run, 14-hit onslaught powered by five homers. Entering the night, the Blue Jays ranked last in baseball with 19 homers vs. left-handed pitchers; and second-last with a .128 ISO against that side of the platoon.

But three homers came in the first two innings off left-handed starter James Paxton. And another came late off lefty reliever Richard Bleier. In one night, the team nearly tied its home run total against left-handed pitchers for the entire month of July (a whopping five). And yet, in a deft comic stroke, it still found a way to go 0-for-7 with runners in scoring position.

That brought Toronto’s average with runners in scoring position over its last seven games to .070 (4-for-57). It dropped Toronto’s season-long average with runners in scoring position to .235 — third-lowest in MLB. Only six teams entered Saturday’s play with a higher wRC+ this season than Toronto’s 108. Only one began the day posting a lower wRC+ with runners in scoring position than Toronto’s 85.

Crazy sport. Look at Berríos. This time last season, every Berríos start was a referendum on the trade that brought him to Toronto and the extension he signed to keep him around long-term. But now, with a turbulent 2022 clearly established as a bizarre outlier in an otherwise consistent, effective, and durable career, Berríos is the last thing Blue Jays fans fret about.

Berríos was robotic in the month of July, pitching to a 1.84 ERA — the lowest of any month in his career — over five starts with nearly 2.5 strikeouts for every walk. He allowed only five extra-base hits in the month (a homer and four doubles), completing five innings or more and allowing two earned runs or less each time out. The last time he strung together five consecutive starts matching that criteria was earlier this season from late-May through mid-June. Prior to that, he’d never done it in his career.

And yet, Saturday was a hard-luck day. He surrendered his fifth-longest homer of the last two seasons — remember, Berríos allowed 29 last year — on a pitch to Devers less than a foot off the ground. He was tagged for three hits on balls that left bats at less than 80 m.p.h. He left after only 85 pitches having allowed more than two earned runs for the first time since June.

“He was great," Schneider said. "Devers did what he does. He hits a ball basically off the ground for a three-run homer. But other than that, I thought Jose was really good. He just continues to be consistent and continues to put us in a really good position to win every time he goes out there."

Crazy sport. The Blue Jays might not have even won this game if not for McGuire and Red Sox third base coach Carlos Febles both believing Connor Wong had homered off of Erik Swanson in the ninth. McGuire was celebrating as he ran home from second; Febles was waving him on as he went. And Kiermaier was getting ready to scale the Green Monster if he had to.

“You don’t put anything past him,” Schneider said. “It was definitely a hold your breath moment.”

And they certainly wouldn’t have won it in nine if not for Kiermaier coming up with a bases-loaded single against left-handed reliever Joe Jacques in the top of the ninth, plating an insurance run at the time that ultimately became the winning one. Over his last three seasons combined, Kiermaier’s hit .253 against left-handed pitching with 11 extra-base hits. This season? He’s hitting .301 with four knocks for extra-bases.

Crazy sport. Ask George Springer. He recently snapped an 0-for-35, jumping up and down at first base with his arms to the skies and a massive grin on his face after a bloop base hit. Saturday, he had four singles off four different pitchers and a walk.

Crazy sport. How about Davis Schneider? Friday, he cleared the Monster in his first big-league at-bat before running out a base hit on a groundball to the second baseman. Saturday, he singled three times and walked once. He has five hits and a walk in his first nine plate appearances at the game’s highest level. Two years ago, he nearly retired.

“Nowhere to go but down now. He messed up. You've got to start slow and build your way up," Belt said. “New name for him is Babe Schneider. That's how he's hitting right now. Baseball is not as easy as he’s made it look the past couple of days."

Crazy sport. Crazy game. Crazy day. And they’ll do it again tomorrow.