Halladay’s way harms M’s
LARRY LARUE; The News Tribune
TORONTO – The Seattle Mariners postgame training room was littered with players Friday – a sure sign that Roy Halladay had been at his best.
The pride of the Blue Jays, the former Cy Young Award winner is always tough on opposing hitters, but when he is on, his pitches move so much they make the best hitters in the game hurt themselves.
So it was in Toronto’s 5-0 victory, where Ichiro Suzuki, Adrian Beltre and Franklin Gutierrez all fouled Halladay pitches off one body part or another, and Ichiro had to leave the game early.
“When you’ve got three or four guys with beat-up shins or feet after the game, you know Roy’s pitched his game,” manager Don Wakamatsu said. “Ichiro and Franklin are sore, but they’re OK. Adrian won’t be able to play (today). He’s really hurting.
“You know the pitches are filthy when Ichiro fouls one off his foot – you never see him do that.”
What manner of pitch, exactly, was it that Ichiro hurt himself on?
“Some kind of fastball,” Ichiro said.
Someone mentioned that Ichiro rarely did such a thing.
“If I did it often, that would be a problem,” Ichiro said.
Halladay was a problem all night, pitching his league-leading eighth complete game, winning for the 16th time, lowering his earned run average to 2.90. And, as much as he made life miserable for Seattle hitters, he also broke the heart of a Mariners pitcher.
Doug Fister.
Making the 10th start of his big-league career, Fister did the seemingly impossible into the fifth inning: he outpitched Halladay, who allowed five hits – including three doubles – in the first four innings.
Over the same span, Fister was ... perfect. He didn’t allow a baserunner until one out into the fifth inning.
“In his last two starts, he’d fall behind in the count and had to pitch defensively,” catcher Kenji Johjima said. “Tonight, he worked ahead in the count, threw a lot of first-pitch strikes. That let him use his curve to his advantage.”
While Fister was perfection, the Mariners’ offense was far from it.
They got doubles from Jose Lopez in the first inning, Mike Carp in the second and Johjima in the fourth – and in the third they had a pair of one-out singles. What happened?
Absolutely nothing, thanks to Halladay. He retired the next batter after each of those doubles, and after the singles by Ichiro and Gutierrez, he got a ground-ball double play from Lopez.
“Nothing he throws is straight, everything moves, and he’s very efficient with his pitches,” Wakamatsu said of Halladay. “We couldn’t take advantage early, and once he got ahead, they took the momentum away entirely.”
Ah, the lead.
One out into the sixth, Fister allowed a single to Jose Bautista and then made his only real mistake of the night on a change-up to Aaron Hill. The Toronto second baseman turned it into his 34th home run of the season – and a 2-0 lead.
For Halladay, that’s often enough.
When Fister gave up two singles in the seventh inning, Wakamatsu went to the bullpen. Chris Jakubauskas bounced a curve in the dirt for a wild pitch, letting both runners advance.
Worse, he gave up a two-run single to Bautista that doubled Toronto’s advantage, 4-0.
“Fister pitched better than his final numbers showed,” Wakamatsu said.
Those numbers: 62/3 innings, seven hits, four runs, no walks, five strikeouts and 92 pitches thrown. Fister tried to be philosophical about it.
“I worked on a lot of things in the bullpen between starts, and I’ve got some more things to work on,” he said. “There were some good things tonight. I tried to work pitch to pitch and not get ahead of myself.”
Was he aware of Halladay’s pitching?
“I focused on the nine guys I had to face,” Fister insisted. “I kept bearing down tonight, I worked hard on location.”
In the end, Halladay and the Blue Jays won. What might have been the 81st win of Seattle’s bounce-back season became the teams 74th loss.
Even now, deep into September, this is a club that hasn’t stopped working.
“I’ve spent a lot of time in the cages with (batting coach) Alan Cockrell, working on going the other way more,” Johjima said. “Tonight, my first double was to right field, my second to left. I felt good about that.”
Carlos Silva made his second relief appearance of the season, working on his sinker, and got two quick outs – one on a ground ball. Then he walked one man and gave up a ground-ball RBI double to Lyle Overbay for the final Blue Jays run.
“I’m closer,” Silva said. “I’m working hard. We all are.”
They’re also the almost-walking wounded. Ichiro, Beltre and Gutierrrez were knicked-up Friday. A night earlier, Mike Sweeney was hit on the left big toe by a pitch, and was still hobbled. And catcher Rob Johnson, who caught Felix Hernandez on Thursday despite a sprained ankle, was limping badly Friday.
Somehow, Wakamatsu will find enough players to take the field today. And they won’t have to face Halladay, so most of them should be able to go nine.
blog.thenewstribune.com/mariners
