Blue Jays at Mariners, August 13-15

The Western swing continues.

Is the universe slowly returning to normal? Hard to tell, but Aaron Loup hit Didi Gregorious with a pitch last week. It was Loup's 3rd HBP in 37.2 IP this season. This is much closer to his career norm, and I expect that soon we'll forget all about those 31 consecutive games this season when Loup didn't hit anyone at all. That was just weird, and deeply disturbing. I thought it was possibly a sign of the End Times myself, and am greatly relieved by anything that suggests a Return to Normalcy. 

Upon consideration, one of the more amusing items on the Jays career pitching leaderboards has to be Loup's presence in 8th place in career HBP.  It's Aaron Loup - who pitched just over 300 innings as a Jay - along with guys like Carpenter and Burnett and Guzman.  Although Duane Ward's spot in a fourth place tie with Dave Stieb for career Wild Pitches is probably just as awesome.

Anyway - the Seattle Mariners. You will recall that the Mariners players were outraged and disappointed when GM Jerry DiPoto traded closer Kendall Gravemen to the Astros the day after the Mariners had rallied for a dramatic win against that very same Houston team, whom Seattle just happen to be chasing in the AL West. They dropped 8 of their next 11 games, including the next two with Houston. At which point, they may have looked around and noticed that the youngster who'd come back from the Astros was filling the gaping hole in their lineup at second base, while hitting .364 with 3 HRs in his first 15 games as a Mariner. Abraham Toro has mostly been a third baseman in the minors - he'd filled in at all the infield spots in Houston, but as long as Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa, and Alex Bregman remained upright he was never going to play regularly there.

The Jays and Mariners met for three games in Buffalo as June turned into July. The Jays took the opener behind Robbie Ray, in a game Earl Weaver would have appreciated. Ty France reached Ray for a three run homer, but the Jays came out on top thanks to a pair of three-run bombs, from Bo Bichette and Marcus Semien. The Mariners won the next day - Steven Matz in his first game back off the COVID list couldn't make it through the third inning. Anthony Kay provided four scoreless innings of relief and the Jays fought back to tie - only to lose when Dylan Moore reached Patrick Murphy for a three run homer in the tenth. The Mariners took the series the following afternoon when Hyun Jin Ryu offered up one of his occasional stinkers. It may not have made much difference what Ryu did anyway, as Yusei Kikuchi was pretty much unhittable that day. We'll see a rematch of that particular matchup tomorrow night.

Yes, there are matchups!

Fri Aug 13 - Ray (9-5, 2.90) vs Flexen (10-5, 3.81)

Sat Aug 14 - Ryu (11-5, 3.62) vs Kikuchi (7-6, 3.73)

Sun Aug 15 - Matz (9-7, 4.28) vs Gilbert (5-3, 4.05)