Blue Jays swept by Twins after brutal managing and baserunning blunders in Game 2

MINNEAPOLIS — Toronto Blue Jays manager John Schneider made a massive mistake when he walked to the mound to remove José Berríos from Game 2 of the American League wild-card series on Wednesday.

It was a quick and decisive call — the type of decision calculated in a meticulous pre-game meeting — but it was still an egregious error. Target Field knew it. Blue Jays fans watching at home knew it. Even Berríos himself couldn’t believe he was leaving after three innings of his best baseball of the year.

Everyone but Schneider, it appears, knew this was an outlandish maneuver. But, when his skipper emerged from the dugout and called for the lefty Yusei Kikuchi, Berríos drooped in disbelief. He was only 47 pitches in; he had so much more left to give.

For context, one day before Wednesday’s 2-0 loss that knocked Toronto out of the playoffs, Schneider spoke about not wanting to get “too cute” with roster and lineup decisions, insisting it was smartest to just play his best guys. The choice to yank his starter in favour of platoon matchups was the complete antithesis of it all.

But in an instant, it was all over. Schneider, certain as he was, strode to the hill and took the ball from Berríos. That choice was hypocritical. It was misguided. And it ultimately cost the Blue Jays their season.

Toronto’s downfall — and eventual elimination from the playoffs — all began in the fourth inning Wednesday, when Berríos walked Royce Lewis, the Twins’ best hitter. Kikuchi came in, forcing the Twins to deal with a left-handed look. It didn’t matter, though, as Minnesota went single-walk-single to open the scoring before a double play plated the second and final run of the game.

“We had a few different plans in place,” Schneider said after the game. “[Berríos] was aware of it. He had electric stuff. Tough to take him out. But I think with the way [the Twins are] constructed, you want to utilize your whole roster. It didn't work out.”

It’s a tough spot, Schneider explained, because the decision looked worse when the Twins tacked on a couple of runs. On top of that, Berríos' exit was magnified since the Jays wound up with zero runs on offence.

“You can sit here and second-guess me, second-guess the organization, second-guess anybody,” said Schneider. “I get that. I get that. And it's tough. And it didn't work out for us today or yesterday.”

While the fateful fourth inning went down, Berríos couldn’t stop pacing. Once the damage was done, he sat on the dugout bench, his head hung between his legs. A man defeated by something he had no say in.

“I just control what I can control,” Berríos said when asked about his removal. “Like I said, I pitched my ass off from the first pitch to the last pitch.”

Forced to watch as his club fumbled the game away, Berríos tried his best to switch gears to become a cheerleader, but it was far too late.

The 2023 Blue Jays have thrived at inflicting varying themes of pain onto their fan base. On Wednesday, they picked atomic agony, pure and absolute. The Berríos saga kicked it all off, but there was a far more egregious mistake later in the game that no doubt gave Blue Jays diehards fits.

There’s nothing — truly nothing — in baseball more embarrassing than getting picked off in a big spot, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. chose the most inopportune time to lose his focus.

The Blue Jays, with the Berríos mess behind them, rallied to get two runners on in the fifth. With two outs, Guerrero clapped at second base, motioning for Bo Bichette, the Jays hitter, to settle down. What he didn’t realize was that Twins shortstop Carlos Correa was creeping behind him. Minnesota pitcher Sonny Gray spun and fired to second, where Correa applied the tag for the out.

Guerrero lay flopped in the dirt with a meek look on his face, hoping a challenge might undo his epic miscue. The replay didn’t save him, and, with that lack of awareness, Guerrero cost his club a scoring opportunity and took the bat from Bichette’s hands.

“It's tough,” Schneider said of Guerrero’s baserunning error. “You've got arguably the best hitter at the plate [in Bichette]. [Gray is] at the end of his pitch count, probably his last hitter… In that moment, that can't happen.”

Then the bad luck came raining in, thick and relentless, as if to karmically punish the Blue Jays for their sloppy play. Toronto mashed three singles together in the sixth, again threatening another comeback.

Matt Chapman unleashed a laser line drive to left field that skipped just inches foul. In a shockingly on-brand development, Chapman bounced into an inning-ending double play on the next pitch. The Blue Jays bats stood no chance after that rally got squashed.

“It’s never fun,” said Chapman, who’s now lost six straight playoff games. “It sucks when you sacrifice a lot to this point and just come up short.”

The Blue Jays have now choked in the AL wild-card series in two consecutive seasons. First with a calamitous collapse in 2022, then this circus of mistakes in 2023. It’s hard to say where the Blue Jays go from here, but sweeping changes are coming. Time will tell who comes and goes, and how the club responds.

Somehow, there’s even less optimism now than there was after last year’s playoffs. This time around, there are no excuses or learning experiences — just one sopping, bottomless pool of misery in which Blue Jays fans must wallow yet again.