Ray's Nightmare 6th Inning Pushes Blue Jays to Brink of Elimination

TORONTO — All eyes focused on the man on the mound.

From the moment Robbie Ray sauntered onto the field for the pre-game warm-ups to his final pitch of the game, a sold-out Rogers Centre crowd of 29,659 lived and died with his every move.

The Blue Jays' playoff aspirations rested firmly in their ace's powerful left arm. Usually, that's recipe for success, but Thursday's 6-2 Blue Jays' loss was no ordinary start for Ray.

The dome's early energy took a big hit in the first inning when Yankees right fielder Aaron Judge obliterated Ray's fastball for a gargantuan 455-foot blast that landed above the WestJet Flight Deck sign in center.

.@TheJudge44 absolutely CRUSHED this baseball. 😱 pic.twitter.com/mYKjX9mDCK
— MLB (@MLB) September 30, 2021

Ray then retired 13 straight batters before Anthony Rizzo blasted a solo shot of his own to tie the game in the sixth. Ray's been vulnerable to the longball all season, but never as vulnerable as he wound up being Thursday.

After Rizzo's home run, the Yankees did it again, and again. Rizzo, Judge (for his second of the game) and Gleyber Torres all homered in the sixth inning as New York scored four runs in the frame. Each home run dealt a bigger and bigger blow to the Blue Jays' playoff chances, and Ray surrendered a season-high five earned runs on just four hits in 5 1/3 innings of work.

GLEYBER TORRES HOME RUN AND THE YANKEES HAVE THREE THIS INNING OFF OF ROBBIE RAY pic.twitter.com/AQdWqsDnwT
— Talkin' Yanks (@TalkinYanks) October 1, 2021

"I think that their game plan against me was to try to lay off the slider and get a fastball out over [the plate]," Ray said. "Those situations, the home runs, I think they were all on fastballs."

Ray indeed allowed all his home runs off the fastball, which he said was a product of not landing his slider in early counts. Well, that and some flat-out good Yankees' hitting.

"They put some good swings on the ball," Ray said. "The Torres [home run] was an 0-2 fastball up-and-away. He put a good swing on it. That's a pitch that I'm trying to throw and he just happens to hit it."

For as chilly as it was in Toronto—a mere 16 degrees Celsius at game time—the ball sure seemed to fly in the Yankees favor and die when the Jays needed a boat.

Before the Bronx Bombers' game-changing sixth inning, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. roasted a screaming liner that came inches away from being a home run and bonked off the top of the wall in the fifth.

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. vs Corey Kluber#WeAreBlueJays

Double 🏃💨

Exit velo: 112.8 mph
Launch angle: 17 deg
Proj. distance: 420 ft

This would have been a home run in 13/30 MLB ballparks

NYY (1) @ TOR (2)
🔻 5th pic.twitter.com/SLLWmoNPGZ
— Would it dong? (@would_it_dong) October 1, 2021

"It's a game of inches, it's funny, and that's one of those," Blue Jays manager Charlie Montoyo said. "[With] Vladdy, you know that ball's going to keep going but for some reason it didn't go out."

Guerrero Jr. settled for an RBI double, but a little extra carry would've altered the flow of the entire ballgame, especially if the Blue Jays found a way to capitalize on scoring chances like Bo Bichette's leadoff double in the eighth.

There was a lot on the line for Ray—after Thursday, his ERA rises to 2.84, which stings his AL Cy Young stock—and even more on the line for the Blue Jays. A loss leaves Toronto a full game back of the Red Sox and Mariners for the second AL wild-card spot with only three games left to play.

Things are about as bleak as can be for the Blue Jays. An Orioles win over the Red Sox buys some time, meaning it's not over for Toronto, but the club will need to play perfect baseball from here on—and get some out-of-town help—to secure a playoff berth.

"We just got to go one game at a time and win every game now, for sure," Montoyo said.