The Blue Jays lost their fourth straight game Saturday night (HOU 6, TOR 5), and they've now lost six of their last seven games overall. Following a busy offseason that featured some high-profile additions, Toronto is currently 17-21 and sitting in fourth place in the AL East.
Third baseman Josh Donaldson, who is one of those high-profile additions, called out his team for their poor play following Saturday's loss. You can watch the video here. Here are Donaldson's comments:
"Like I said, I can only control what I do, the guy beside me can only control what they do. It's really just about going out there and either getting the job done ... this isn't the 'try' league, this is the 'get it done' league. And you know, eventually they're gonna find people who are going to get it done."
...
"Anytime you lose a game it's tough, I think it makes it a little harder to swallow because for the most part we're going out there and you we're doing what we need to do. Eventually we hope the ball starts rolling in our favor."
The Blue Jays lead baseball with an average of 5.21 runs scored per game, so offense has hardly been a problem. Donaldson himself is hitting .311/.380/.534 (152 OPS+) with eight home runs while playing his typically excellent defense at third base.
The pitching staff is another matter. The Jays are allowing 4.89 runs per game, fourth most in baseball, and the rotation has a 5.30 ERA, second worst in all of baseball. Daniel Norris has the lowest ERA in the rotation (3.86) and he was sent to Triple-A not too long away due to control issues. Veterans Mark Buehrle (5.54 ERA) and R.A. Dickey (5.76 ERA) have been bad and Opening Day starter Drew Hutchison (6.17 ERA) has been even worse.
In the grand scheme of things, Donaldson's comments were pretty tame. He didn't name names, but the "I can only control what I do" and "eventually they're gonna find people who are going to get it done" remarks come across poorly. Donaldson's not wrong though. The Blue Jays are playing poorly and if things don't improve, the personnel will change. That's baseball.
