Last week we went in hot with some Charlie Montoyo as the Black Knight takes. It was the lowest of lows last Monday in a 14-8 loss at the hands of Tampa Bay. Then the team rallied, taking 2 of 3 games from the Yankees and were cruising their way to a sweep of Cleveland. Only to have that sweep come completely unhinged in the bottom of the 7th inning today. I don’t know what it is with me watching double headers in Cleveland - I once spent about 7 hours in the stadium over 2 days and saw two rain outs. So watching today’s double header was bound to go sideways.
The Jays let Cleveland come back to 4-4 in the sixth. Then, with the game being a shortened 7-inning scenario making up the double header, The Jays took the lead in the top of 7. Tyler Chatwood, who had been a great arm in the bullpen until recently could not find the strike zone. And here’s where it gets interesting. Montoyo didn’t get anyone up in the pen until it was too late, like four walks in the bottom of 7 late. Walked the tying run in.
Chatwood couldn’t find much of the strike zone, just 7 strikes in 32 pitches, while the Jays skipper watched helplessly or defiantly, choosing not to get anyone up until it was too late. Post game, not only was #Montoyo trending, so was #Gibby, the previous manager and perennial fan favourite. And remember all of this happening while the city of Toronto was already on edge this weekend after the Maple Leafs lost game six of their playoff series forcing a winner take all game seven tomorrow.
As Keegan Matheson called it, “Keeping Tyler Chatwood out there that long was tough to watch. He clearly didn't have it. I guess walks four and five... helped to confirm that?” Fun fact, Chatwood’s strike ratio apparently hasn’t been seen since they first tracked that stat in 1988. So all time his 22% strike rate is literally the worst. Shouldn’t there be alerts on an app somewhere in the clubhouse to alert the managers? Or was Charlie just thinking about this insane portioned peanut butter while in Ohio? Or perhaps when they saw this post about Barry Bonds getting intentionally walked with the bases loaded 23 years ago, they thought, hey, that’s a really cool idea.
Likely the only thing worse in Toronto baseball this week was the very short launch and then merciful cancelling of New Era’s “Local Market” hat collection. While they didn’t get left in to walk 4 batters, they didn’t last long. The Washington Post described the project this way, “The concept was sound — yay, civic pride — but the execution, which may or may not have involved a bot combing a limited inventory of ’90s era clip art until it came across something loosely associated with each team’s home, was flawed.”
We’ll get to the Jays edition, but I think the best reaction of these hats was based on Cleveland’s hat, “if you like clip art and area codes and fifth grade art projects and wait is that a pierogi and good grief enough with the guitars – then boy do i have a hat for you.” But the Jays hat was no better.
And I've never been more ashamed of still having that 647 number as I did when seeing this hat. “There’s nothing truly objectionable about the Toronto cap. But it does feel like they picked stereotypical Canada things — a maple leaf and poutine, a Quebec specialty — and went with it,” writes Levi Weaver in The Athletic. “The maple leaf is a fine symbol emblematic of Canada’s baseball team … which is why it’s already part of the team’s logo. It’s right there!”
What a wonderful disaster these hats were. Sometimes you wonder how things could ever get passed the idea stage. The best reaction was the Kansas City Royals who ended up changing their Twitter bio to reflect the stuff from their hats.
Walkoffs
Old time baseball
Shoeless Joe Jackson at the ready.
My next obsession
I can think of nothing else but fried chicken in a baseball helmet.
Until Next Week
Get ready to dive into another week.
