Blue Jays 4, Yankees 1: They're Called "Bullpen Days" Because They're A Lot of Fun

Charles McAdoo getting it Charles McAdone

At what may have appeared at first glance a kind of "scheduled loss," as they sometimes say—a Blue Jays' bullpen day in which the Yankees' Cy Young-favourite Cam Schlittler would face a lineup lacking both Vladdy (concussion protocol) and George Springer (the years, man; just the years)—turned out entirely otherwise, which actually maybe shouldn't have come as the surprise that it lightly did? Consider, I suppose, how the Blue Jays' previous two bullpen games against the Yankees had gone: most recently, there was the May 21 encounter, in which a whole bunch of our guys combined to pitch a three-hit shutout, with fourteen strikeouts (that is honestly so many) set against just three walks (a pleasing few); prior to that, of course, we had Game Four (oh dang, that was the very last one) of the 2025 ALDS, which went very much our way as well (perhaps you recall it). The Yankees' starter on that auspicious day (Blue Jays-auspicious, I mean), was of course the selfsame Cam Schlittler. And there he was again yesterday, this long guy of a Yankee righty, honestly doing a pretty great job: when a starter pitches into the sixth, and allows just the one run, although I do think it reasonable to have hoped he might have lasted another inning or so, you'll for sure take it, right? Aside from Alejandro Kirk pinballing one up the middle off of Jazz Chisholm Jr.'s glove to score young Brett Bateman (who is already showing signs of that peculiar baseball gift of somehow being involved in everything all the time), there was nothing of great note, and Schlitter left with the game tied at one (the Yankees' run had come in the second off of former top prospect Ricky Tiedemann, making his much-delayed MLB début [delayed through no real fault of his own {his arm kept exploding, basically}]). Our go-ahead run came in the seventh, on rookie Charles McAdoo's double to bring home Ernie Clement, and McAdoo's RBI-single in the eighth contributed to a general feeling of ease as Louis Varland registered his third save in four days on a total of twenty-two pitches (as in, he has averaged just over seven pitches in each of these recent outings). I know we have lightly joshed amidst and among these electronic pages previously that just about every day is a bullpen day of one kind or another, but I think Saturday's game really illustrates the extent to which that is the case in the contemporary game (even though it remains totally clear what we mean by "a bullpen day," and I am not trying to outwit the plain sense of things [please stop accusing me of it]): on an appointed bullpen day, the Blue Jays used seven pitchers—seven!—to hold the Yankees to their lone run, but the Yankees, behind a good start from the likeliest winner of this year's AL Cy Young Award (the only other strong contender is our own Dylan Cease, who pitches today as we look for the sweep [a delicious situation obviously]), used fully five. And again, the Yankees did so not because a wonky starter got shelled, or because things totally got away from one or more of the relievers that followed. But it was still five pitchers. I think that's interesting! 

And so for a time yesterday (several hours, really), the Blue Jays found themselves the sole occupant of the final Wild Card spot, depending on how significantly you wanted to figure, but functionally were part of an inherently charismatic five-way tie with the Rangers, Orioles, Tigers, and Twins. Later in the evening, the Twins lost, and so fell off the pace a little, and the Rangers won, putting them a half-game ahead of the remaining three. All of this rules, obviously. The Blue Jays join the clever Rays as the only AL team to be over .500 in their last ten games (seven-and-three for our guys [the Rays have rolled along at eight-and-two]); they are also winners of seven of their last nine, you could say; or you might prefer to note that they are ten-and-five so far in August. The way I am thinking about just how good things have been lately (despite nobody but Alejandro Kirk [walked intentionally yesterday, two times over] getting especially hot at the plate [the pitching, of course, has really been something]) is that starting last Monday, the Blue Jays entered a thirteen-game stretch in which they play Boston, New York, Tampa Bay, and New York again, all games against not just divisional rivals that are better than us (granted, granted), but against seemingly sure-thing playoff teams (I am going to add up current FanGraphs playoff chances for those teams, and then divide by three, and then tell you what that number is: okay it is 97.5%). And so far our record in those games is a legitimately startling five-and-one, with Dylan Cease pitching today. This of course makes no sense, and things certainly cannot be expected to continue quite like this, but what could easily have been the dreariest part of the season (and to be fair things can only get so dreary: they're still playing baseball) is instead proving to be just enormously fun to be around.  

KS