Kevin Gausman’s Major League debut wasn’t supposed to go like this, but apparently Canadians don’t celebrate “Gausmas.”
While the youngster wasn’t superb, he showed some flashes of brilliance, and pitched well enough to give his team a chance to win. When Buck pulled “GasMan” after 5.0 IP, the O’s were trailing 4-3 in a game where they would ultimately go on to score six runs.
Gausman’s final line: 5.0 IP, 7 H, 4 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, 1 HR. He had a bit of trouble locating his off-speed pitches, and Toronto made him pay once they were able to finally time his fastball, which was routinely in the 95-97 range. The most annoying/unsettling part of the kid’s outing was that he was unable to manage even one clean inning. He retired the first two batters in the second, third, and fifth innings, but couldn’t find that elusive 1-2-3 inning.
In the fifth, the Jays finally made him pay for it. With the O’s leading 3-2, Gausman came to the mound with a chance to put himself in line for a victory. He struck out Jose Bautista and induced a fly ball from Edwin Encarnacion, and looked to be on his way out of danger, especially after jumping ahead of Adam Lind 0-2. He couldn’t put Lind away though, and the lefty laced a single on 1-2.
The next batter, J.P. Arencibia – who had been right on Gausman’s fastball from the start – smashed a two-run home run on the first pitch he saw. Gausman got out of the fifth, but not before allowing Toronto to take a 4-3 lead.
Still, the O’s were in it.
Unfortunately, the Birds bullpen once again reminded us that 2013 isn’t 2012, and allowed eight more Blue Jays to cross the plate before all was said and done.
The worst of it was that, once again, an O’s pitcher couldn’t find the third out. Troy Patton retired the first two batters he saw in the sixth, and was poised for the O’s first 1-2-3 frame with ninth-place hitter Munenori Kawasaki coming up. The left-handed shortstop was just 2-for-16 against southpaws this season, so Troy was in the driver’s seat.
Instead, Patton issued a walk.
And then another one.
Buck replaced the command-challenged reliever with another command-challenged reliever, Pedro Strop.
Strop proceeded to walk Bautista to load the bases. The next batter, Encarnacion, took care of business, crushing a grand slam to left, scoring all three runners who had reached via two-out free pass.
Ugh.
Back-to-back home runs from Nick Markakis and Adam Jones in the eighth brought the O’s to within 8-6, but in the bottom of the frame T.J. McFarland – with some uncharacteristically shoddy defense around him – gave up four more runs, and that was all she wrote.
The O’s will look to even the series tonight, as their most consistent starter of late, Chris Tillman (3-2, 3.52), takes on Sean Nolin, a 6’5″ lefty who will himself be making his MLB debut.
Hopefully the Birds can return the favor and make it as miserable for Nolin and Toronto did to them last night.
