Blue Jays takeaways: Robbie Ray’s Houdini act wasn’t enough to escape with a win in K.C.

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This article was published 18/04/2021 (1667 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The view from Deep Left Field on Sunday’s Blue Jays-Royals game:

Robbie Ray, making his second start of the season, was mostly not very good in Sunday’s 2-0 loss in Kansas City, despite not giving up a run.

Ray walked two batters in each of the first three innings, loading the bases in the first and second, but somehow grunted and tight-pantsed his way into getting huge outs when he needed them.

The Royals had 12 men come to the plate with at least one runner in scoring position over Ray’s five-inning stint, and the only one to get a hit was Carlos Santana — a first-inning single that didn’t score a run.

With the bases loaded and one out in the first, Ray popped up lefty-killer Hanser Alberto, then got Hunter Dozier to ground out on the next pitch.

After a 26-pitch first inning, Ray threw 21 more in the second, this time loading the bases on back-to-back two-out walks. Again he wriggled off the hook by getting a first-pitch out — this time a lazy fly to left by once and future hero Salvador Perez.

After another set of back-to-back two-out walks in the third, Ray got rookie Kyle Isbel on a weak grounder back to the mound and that was it for the free passes.

Ray is going to walk people — it’s just what he does — and he’s going to have meltdown games where his control completely deserts him as it did on Sunday, when Kansas City sent 17 hitters to the plate over the first three innings. But the fact that even in a game like that the southpaw managed to grind through five innings, and not give up a run, is huge. Most pitchers with the stuff that Ray brought to the ballpark for the series finale are out in the third inning having given up six.

On a day when the bullpen was very clearly super-thin, given reliever use in the seventh and eighth, Ray really made some chicken salad and deserved a better result.

• Hole at the top: It’s folly to make grand decisions based on 16 games, but what’s clear is that the Jays need a lot more than they’re getting from the leadoff spot, which has been occupied by Marcus Semien for every one of those contests.

George Springer is the man the Jays want hitting out of the top spot in the order, but he’s been out with first an oblique strain then a quad issue. Semien has been keeping the spot warm for him, but he really hasn’t done much.

It’s not as though the Jays are hitting well as a team, but with Semien’s 0-for-4 on Sunday, the leadoff man is down to .182/.247/.364 for the season. Semien shares the club lead with Bo Bichette and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. with four home runs, but he only has eight other hits and has struck out 19 times. He’s hitless in his last 10 at-bats and two for his last 20.

There may be some reluctance to move Semien out of the top spot, since Springer should be back relatively soon, but someone on base more often than 25 per cent of the time in front of Bichette and Guerrero would be nice.

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That’s not to say Semien couldn’t heat up. He certainly will at some point — he’s a much better hitter than this — but this is his ninth big-league season and he’s only been an above-average hitter in one of them.

• Good news, bad news: There was good news about some injured relievers before the game, with pitching coach Pete Walker saying both Tyler Chatwood and Jordan Romano should be back after the minimum 10 days on the injured list, but that didn’t help Sunday.

With the ’pen strapped, the call had to go to T.J. Zeuch to face the middle of the Royals’ order in the seventh inning of a 0-0 tie. It did not go well, as Zeuch gave up three rockets on his first three pitches, the second one a two-run shot by Perez for the only runs of the game.

Tanner Roark was called upon to clean up the mess and he did, retiring four straight after walking the first hitter.

With a healthy bullpen, we’re seeing Chatwood, Romano or David Phelps in that spot, as opposed to a pitch-to-contact rookie sinkerballer, but right now he’s all they’ve got.

Mike Wilner is a Toronto-based baseball columnist for the Star. Follow him on Twitter: @wilnerness