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Blue Jays spoil Buehrle’s gem in loss to White Sox

By Keegan Matheson

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The Toronto Blue Jays dropped game one against the Chicago White Sox 4-2 on Monday night. The fast-moving pitcher’s duel was quiet offensively, with all four of Chicago’s runs coming unearned to rob Buehrle of the win.

Both lefty starters controlled play and scattered their base runners well, but for a while, it seemed as if the Blue Jays would tame the surging Chris Sale. The crippling blow came in the eighth, when Jose Reyes allowed a Little League grounder to go right through his legs which led to the go-ahead runs.

The complete 8.0 inning start from Buehrle will buy the bullpen a day of rest, at the very least, and sets the table for lefty Felix Doubront to make his first start with the Blue Jays on Tuesday.

Final. 4. 128. 2. 39

Game Notes:

  • Monday marked a homecoming for Mark Buehrle, whose fantastic career in Chicago earned him a standing ovation from the White Sox fans. In 12 years with Chicago, Buehrle won 161 games with a 3.83 ERA.
  • Manager John Gibbons absolutely loaded up on right-handed bats against the left-handed Sale, with zero pure lefties in the starting nine. Justin Smoak continues to struggle to find opportunities despite his impressive play of late, but his time will come.
    • Chris Colabello

    got the party started in the third with his eighth home run of the season. Shouldn’t deep flies against Chris Sale count for two? Perhaps the Legend of BABIP isn’t ready to regress just yet.

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  • Chicago broke through is a less dramatic way, as Chris Colabello botched the throw in after an Avisail Garcia single, allowing Melky Cabrera to score. Colabello would snag a blazing liner and double up Garcia shortly after, however, to break even on the inning.
  • Kevin Pillar continued his incredible defensive play in the fifth, robbing Tyler Flowers of what would have been extra bases (or a wall-scraping home run) with a jumping catch. Pillar tracks fly balls with great confidence, and there isn’t a pitcher on this roster that doesn’t owe him dinner.
  • Josh Donaldson would put the Blue Jays back out in front in the top of the sixth with his 20th home run of the season. All-Star worthy, one might say.
  • Jose Reyes and Jose Bautista showed both ends of the defensive spectrum in the eighth.  After Reyes allowed a simple grounder to sneak through his legs, Bautista helped out Mark Buehrle with a great sliding catch in the foul territory of right field. Gordon Beckham would eventually come around to score, though, on a Jose Abreu bloop single.

    • Melky Cabrera came back to haunt his old team in the next at-bat, doubling in Eaton and Abreu on a hard grounder down the left field line to move the White Sox ahead 4-2.

    Game Ball. <strong>Mark Buehrle</strong>. STARTING PITCHING . A. Mark Buehrle deserved a better fate, with all four of his runs coming unearned. While we must credit Chicago with a handful of timely hits, errors undermined an otherwise sterling effort.<p>With quality starts an extremely rare commodity for the Blue Jays, this letdown isn’t acceptable. Despite the woes elsewhere in the rotation, however, Buehrle seems locked in for a strong second half. If he pitches like this every outing, the Jays will win far more often than they lose.</p>

    Game Ball. <b>Josh Donaldson</b>. HITTING . C-. Donaldson continued his strong season with a 2-for-3 night, highlighted by his 20th home run. As a whole, Toronto was limited to six hits. Despite facing one of the league’s top pitchers, that’s not the type of effort that will get it done.

    MVJ:  Papa Buehrle

    Next: Blue Jays could reportedly target Jason Grilli

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