TORONTO – Vladimir Guerrero Jr. failed to provide some joy to the Toronto Blue Jays for the first time in weeks.
He did tie a career-best by extending his hit streak to 22 games earlier in the afternoon. But down a run in the ninth inning, the mighty Blue Jays slugger went to bat with Daulton Varsho on first base and one out.
Guerrero, however, whiffed on a 103.3 miles-per-hour heater from Oakland Athletics flame-thrower Mason Miller for strike three.
The Blue Jays (54-63) eventually lost 1-0, as the Athletics (49-69) tied their three-game series on Saturday.
“That’s what you pay to come see, even after two and a half hours later, of not much going on,” Toronto manager John Schneider said.
“You’re just expecting him to hit one out there, basically.”
Guerrero and Miller engaged in a four-pitch duel. The Blue Jays hitter swung and missed on a 100.1 miles-per-hour pitch and took a ball outside to even the count. Guerrero hit a fly ball down the right-field line foul, about six rows into the seats on pitch No. 3.
The strikeout pitch was a 103.3 miles-per-hour blur. Strike three. Game over. Miller had his 17th save.
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“Miller’s one of the best relief pitchers in baseball and you say, ‘Here you go,'” Schneider said. “He made 103 with his last pitch. Those are the matchups you’d like to see. We just came up on the wrong end of it today. But I thought that it was, ‘here you go, hit my best stuff,’ to our best hitter.”
Brent Rooker’s 29th homer off the top of the left-field wall with two out in the sixth inning was all the Athletics needed because starter Osvaldo Bido (3-3) was at his best before 34,312 at Rogers Centre.
For the fourth straight game, Guerrero Jr. extended his hit streak in the first inning. But after a second-inning leadoff bloop single from Ernie Clement, that was the entire hit attack for the home side.
Bido retired the final 15 of 16 batters he faced, hitting Leo Jimenez in the fifth inning.
The Blue Jays failed to get a runner to second base.
Guerrero went one for four. After his hard-hit single to right, he was tossed out on a check swing dribbler to the catcher in the fourth and a sharply hit comebacker to Osvaldo to end the sixth.
Toronto starter Yariel Rodriguez (1-5) managed 5 2/3 innings. He was knocked off the mound after Shea Langeliers followed Rooker’s homer with his third single.
It was Rodriguez’s 85th pitch of the afternoon, right on the number the Blue Jays brain trust had budgeted.
“Definitely, I felt good about getting that last out (in the sixth),” Rodriguez said. “But there was the plan we had.”
Langeliers completed a four-for-four outing with another single in the ninth inning.
The Athletics snapped a string of eight straight games without a double play. They got two for the price of one after Toronto catcher Brian Serven’s leadoff walk in the third inning, and Spencer Horwitz was hit by a pitch in the seventh.
Scott Alexander, Tyler Ferguson and Miller kept the two-hit shutout alive for the Athletics with effective seventh, eighth and ninth innings, respectively.
BIG WHIFF
When Clement struck out in the fourth inning, he ended a streak of 35 straight at-bats without a whiff. It was the second-longest current streak in Major League Baseball.
The 28-year-old right-handed-hitting utility infielder moved to fifth in the batting order because of his recent offensive output.
Since June 12, the native of Rochester, N.Y., has hit .306 (48 for 157) with 11 doubles, four homers and 23 RBI.
ON DECK
Chris Bassitt (9-10) will start for Toronto in the finale of the three-game set against Oakland on Sunday. The Athletics will counter with lefty JP Sears (9-8).
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 10, 2024.