Blue Jays' leadership fails to capitalize on a winnable game against the Yankees

The Toronto Blue Jays just threw away a game that could come back to haunt them down the road this season. At 21-26 after a 7-6 loss to the New York Yankees, the Blue Jays are now 3-7 against opponents from the AL East. The Yankees, at 29-19, were scuffling somewhat coming into Monday nights game as losers of their last two contests, and 3-7 overall in their last ten, and looked like they were ready to roll over on another one, until the Blue Jays allowed them to get back into the contest, thanks to some questionable decision making.

Last year, the Blue Jays won the AL East division thanks to a regular season tie-breaker with the Yankees. They were 8-5 against the Bronx Bombers, who matched their 94-68 record overall. This highlights the importance of these divisional games and last year the Blue Jays had a winning record against everyone in their division except for the Rays in which they were 6-7 against, but swept them in three straight in the final weekend of the regular season.

With a chance to get to being three games below .500, the Blue Jays held a 5-3 lead in the top of the seventh at Yankee Stadium, and had two outs in the inning. Canadian left-handed rookie reliever Adam Macko, making his MLB debut, got the final out of the sixth, and the first two outs in the seventh, before he was lifted for Yariel Rodriguez.

Rodriguez allowed a single to Aaron Judge, a two-run home run to Cody Bellinger, a walk to Trent Grisham, a two-run home run to Jazz Chisholm Jr. and then got Anthony Volpe to fly out to end the inning. But by that point, the Yankees had take a 7-5 lead, and Rodriguez was saddled with a stat line of 0.1 innings pitched, four runs allowed on three hits and a walk.

Blue Jays faced more issues than just questionable pitching changes

We can second guess the decision to bring in Rodriguez in that spot for the rest of the week. Frankly, when you say you're going to a closer by committee situation, but don't use one of Jeff Hoffman, Louis Varland or Tyler Rogers in the bottom of the seventh against Judge and the heart of the Yankees order than what exactly defines a closer's committe?

But the real issue was how the Blue Jays delpoyed their offence in the top of the ninth. After Hoffman came in and got through the bottom of the eighth with the score still 7-5, the Blue Jays almost immediately got the tying run in scoring position. Ernie Clement, who has a walk rate of just 3.3%, understood the assignment. He already drove in four runs in the game with a three run home run and an RBI ground out, but he understood the assignment and walked to lead off the inning against David Bednar, who had blown a save just the night before.

With Clement on first, manager John Schneider pinch-hit the lefty Jesús Sánchez in place of the righty Myles Straw. Sánchez doubled down the line in right and it scored Clement giving the Blue Jays three tries to tie the game.

The first attempt went to Brandon Valenzuela, the rookie catcher who is fifth on the team with four home runs. But instead of trying to play into his power, the bench staff wanted him to bunt. He failed, and struck out. Valenzuela had never attempted a sac bunt at the big league level, meanwhile Tyler Heineman has four just this season.

Another rookie stepped to the plate in Yohendrick Piñango, and he managed to work a seven pitch walk to get two men aboard. With two walks, and a double already allowed in the inning, this was the moment for the top of the order to come through. George Springer stepped in and immediately had three balls thrown his way that were nowhere near the strike zone.

But he promptly let Bednar off the hook. The Blue Jays didn't give Springer the take sign and he swung at three consecutive pitches that were below the zone. On one hand, you have to admire him for trying to be the hero, on the other, it's incredibly frustrating to see a veteran of his caliber not read the situation.

Bednar, at that point, had thrown 27 pitches with 14 of them (51%) being thrown for balls. If Springer had just exuded some patience, he would have loaded the bases with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. coming up to bat with one out. This is a place Guerrero Jr. has loved hitting in, with a .308 batting average, 16 home runs and a 1.002 OPS in 48 career games played.

Instead, Springer swung and three pitches that scraped his shins and Vladdy came up with two on and one out. He got into a 2-0 count, but just like Springer, tried to make something out of nothing and chased the third and fourth pitch way outside. On a 2-2 pitch he chopped a 90.7 mph splitter that was left at the top of the zone, right over the second base bag and the second baseman Chisholm threw it to first for the easy out and the third out of the ninth.

The Blue Jays need someone to start taking some leadership in these situations. Whether it's Schenider, Springer or Vladdy there has to be better execution in these situations, or these division games will be completely out of reach by season's end.

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