I know, I know, all the Hit By Pitch records are earlier in the season. Must be the weather. However, what makes this one interesting that is that not only is the Jays record for hitting opposing batters by pitch in a single game, but it exposes just how quickly the season and the roster had unraveled for the 2017 Blue Jays, running out a collection of cast-offs, has-beens and never-were for this team not even 40 games into the season. The record was earned on a game against Atlanta on May 15, 2017, at home.
Let me take you back to the season of 2017, but most Jays fans wouldn’t be quick to revisit that particular season without extreme coercion involved. It was an awful season, as the Jays went from back-to-back deep playoff runs to see their record collapse to 76-86. More painfully, fan favourite Jose Bautista went from being the impact core of a potent offence to being a below-average bat and a defensive liability. The only bright spot was Josh Donaldson who had yet another dominant year at the plate. Still, the Front Office inexplicably chose not to move him for a significant package at the deadline or in the off-season, and he’d spend most of 2018 injured and netted only Julien Merryweather in trade.
The team came into the game with a 17-22 record, but there were some glimmers of hope as they took the field at Rogers Centre. They’d won five in a row and were facing Bartolo Colon in the twilight of his career. Colon had a terrible start to his year and went into Toronto 1-4 for the year, just coming off a rough outing against the Astros where he had surrendered eight earned runs over 5.2 innings, including three home runs. He went into the game suffering from a head cold, an upset stomach and a headache; not ideal when facing a ballclub on a hot streak. However, Big Sexy had a good game in him, going 5.2 innings and allowing just two earned runs.
The Jays were running out Mike Bolsinger for the game, having run into a streak of starter injuries, and it would turn out to be his last year in the majors, bouncing up and down with the club while being largely awful on the bump. In the first inning, he hit the second batter, the pesky Brandon Phillips, with a curveball on an 0-2 count.
In the top of the second with the score already 2-0 Atlanta, Adonis Garcia came to the plate. Garcia, whose big-league career would end in just a few weeks from them, took a 1-1 changeup to lead off the inning. Garcia stole second and moved to third on a throwing error and scored on a Dansby Swanson sacrifice fly to centre.
In the fourth, with a man on second, Jace Peterson ignored two cutters on the outside corners before being plunked in the foot by a curveball. Swanson would bring in a run with a single to right field to make it 4-1 Atlanta. In the sixth, with the Jays now down 9-3, Leonel Campos faced Tyler Flowers. If you’d forgotten Leonel Campos was ever a Blue Jay, you’re not alone. Campos had already allowed a three-run homer to Freddie Freeman earlier in the inning, and plunked Flowers on a 1-2 fastball inside.
In the top of the eighth with one out and a man on first, new pitcher Aaron Loup missed with a low slider outside and then hit Nick Markakis with an inside fastball, driving the number of HBP for the combined Jays pitchers to 5. Loup managed to strike out the next two batters to get out of the inning. The Jays narrowed the gap slightly in the bottom of the ninth with a two-run home run from Justin Smoak, but ultimately fell 10-6 to the Braves. They’d go 1-5 over the next six games, eliminating the gains from their hot streak before a second hot streak to finish off May with a 26-27 record.
Considering that the Jays have featured starters with some level of notoriety for being willing to pitch inside, like Jack Morris and Dave Steib, it’s almost heartening that the record of HBP by Jays pitchers wasn’t about tough matchups and grudge games against classic rivals. Instead, it was just good old terrible pitching by terrible pitchers on a terrible roster during a terrible season that seized this particular record.
2017… blech.