Yesterday's game got me thinking about West Coast road trips, and how the Jays always seem to suffer through the first game. Is this true? Read on to find out.
For this mini-study, I looked at games played in the Pacific Time Zone with one stipulation: the Blue Jays must have played in the Eastern Time Zone on the previous day.
June 15, 2004 in San Fran? Gone from the study; the 14th was an off-day.
July 19, 2004 in Oakland? The 18th saw the Jays play in Texas, which is definitely not EST.
So I went through Retrosheet's game logs for every season from 1977 to 2004 and added in the two games from this season, April 11 in Oakland and yesterday in Seattle. All told, there were 32 games:
Date Opponent TOR OPP 06/01/79 SEA L 2 7 06/15/82 CAL W 2 0 09/06/82 OAK W 3 1 06/07/83 OAK L 3 5 06/23/83 SEA W 5 4 07/04/85 OAK L 2 3 05/07/86 CAL L 2 6 05/02/88 SEA L 5 7 04/24/89 OAK L 4 5 06/19/89 CAL W 8 1 05/23/90 CAL L 4 5 07/05/91 SEA W 2 1 09/16/91 SEA L 5 6 05/28/93 OAK L 2 3 08/26/93 SEA L 3 6 04/11/94 OAK W 14 5 07/03/95 CAL L 2 4 04/17/96 CAL L 1 5 06/13/96 CAL L 4 6 05/30/97 OAK L 7 12 09/10/97 OAK L 2 3 05/01/98 OAK L 2 5 08/17/98 OAK W 4 2 04/26/99 ANA L 3 4 04/24/00 OAK W 3 2 07/27/00 SEA W 7 2 05/01/01 OAK W 5 4 08/12/02 OAK W 2 1 08/11/03 SEA W 5 3 05/31/04 SEA L 2 6 04/11/05 OAK W 10 3 05/30/05 SEA L 3 4
I know, I know. Too much raw data. Well, here's a graph for you:
That huge dip near the beginning? That's around 1986-1988, just when the Jays were getting good. Interesting how that works. Please note how they finally pushed the differential above zero about halfway through: with a 14-5 win in Oakland on April 11, 1994. (Oakland also shows up on April 11 this year, 11 years to the day since the last Special West Coast Game.) If you glance back up to the Special West Coast Game table, you'll see that this 1994 game was preceded by three straight losses and followed by six more. Toronto has never done well in these Special West Coast Games (SWCG).
In fact, their record in SWCG is 13-19, a WPct of .406. Now, where have we seen a record that bad before? Yes, you guessed it -- the Jays' performance in SWCG is worse than their performance in the Season From Hell. And they haven't had a road record under .400 since...well, last year.
I think you get the point -- nearly every Special West Coast Game is like the Season From Hell. Interestingly, there was one SWCG last year -- a SFHSWCG, if you will -- on May 31, 2004, exactly one year ago today. And guess who the Jays were playing? Seattle. Guess who the starter was? Jamie Moyer. Guess who relieved the Jays' starter and pitched two scoreless innings, allowing only one hit? Vinny Chulk! Jim Wolf was an umpire in both games! Ichiro! scored a run in both games!
Okay, that's enough -- we don't need another Patriot's Day debacle on our hands here.
The point is, the Jays are not good on the first game of a Western road trip. I know what they feel like. Maybe I should just post Ted Lilly's Game Score chart and call it a night. I mean, a morning. Night? Ah hell, it's 2:30 as I write this, you decide whether it's Tuesday morning or Monday night.
I have nothing to add re: last night's game aside from the fact that Russ Adams should have pinch-hit for John McDonald in the ninth. Adams has all of 10 AB vs LHP this year, ranking ahead of only two players. One is Aaron Hill, the other is a pure platoon player. Is Russ Adams the shortstop version of Frank Catalanotto? We don't know yet, and only exposure to left-handed pitching will help us, the front office, the coaching staff or anyone else determine this.
