Cease's 7-inning gem goes for naught in Blue Jays' deflating 11-inning loss

CHICAGO -- Thursday looked like one of those days where the Blue Jays could use as a reason to cling to hope for a deep postseason run, heck, or even a return of October baseball.

Dylan Cease was magnificent for seven innings, the defense was strong and the bullpen was just as solid for five outs. But the Blue Jays needed six outs from their relievers, and their woes with runners in scoring position stopped them from picking up a win in a makeup contest against the Cubs.

Alex Bregman hit a two-strike, two-out two-run home run in the ninth to force extras and Pete Crow-Armstrong scored on a throwing error from catcher Brandon Valenzuela as he stole third to walk it off and hand the Blue Jays a 3-2 loss in 11 innings at Wrigley Field.

But it likely won’t be Bregman’s blast or Crow-Armstrong’s swipe that the Blue Jays will be kicking themselves about -- it’s the 1-for-19 with runners in scoring position and the 13 runners left on base in the loss. The Blue Jays outhit the Cubs 11-5, but failed to advance the extra-innings runner past second base in both frames.

“Just didn’t get the hits we needed to,” manager John Schneider said. “There’s a lot left on. It gets magnified, obviously, in extras when you get a guy there. But just couldn’t sequence them out the way we wanted to today against [Cubs starter David] Peterson or really the rest of the way, except for [Alejandro Kirk’s RBI single in the seventh]. Had chances to add on. Leadoff double in the ninth, had a chance to add on.”

It’s been a bugaboo for the Blue Jays this season. They have the second-fewest plate appearances in baseball with runners in scoring position (991), and their .695 OPS in those situations is fifth-worst. They had runners in scoring position in eight of their 11 innings on Thursday.

And it spoiled a terrific outing from their ace, Cease. The right-hander tossed seven scoreless innings, striking out 10 and permitting just two hits and a walk.

“You want to get the offense going,” Schneider said. “You want to either get some timely hits or add some slug like we’ve talked about a lot. The other phases of the game, I like what they’re doing. I like the way they’re competing, and you got to brush this off, leave it here and go on to Philly.”

It was the continuation of a dominant stretch for Cease. The right-hander owns a 0.84 ERA (4 ER/43 IP) and 0.67 WHIP over his last six starts. He continued that hot stretch Thursday by using his full repertoire. Cease used almost all his six pitches his first time through the order, keeping the Cubs’ lineup guessing. He leaned more heavily on his fastball-slider mix as the game wore on, and that allowed him to be dominant throughout the outing.

That diversity of his pitch mix allowed the fastball-slider combo, particularly the heater, to improve as the day wore on. Cease’s average fastball velocity jumped from 94.9 mph in the first inning to a peak of 97.3 mph in the sixth. Two of his hardest thrown pitches came in the seventh.

“I feel like I’m mixing in more variety of pitches and I feel like I’m getting them to better spots, too,” Cease said. “It feels like some days in the past would really just be very slider-fastball heavy, and if I didn’t have one or the other, it would be a massive grind. Where now I can mix in a first-pitch curveball -- and go to the sweeper and go to the sinker -- and things like that that I haven’t historically done very well in the past, and that’s helping me just diversify my pitches and be less predictable.”

The Blue Jays had jumped ahead in the first inning when Kazuma Okamoto scored from third base after Peterson had disengaged three times off the mound. The left-hander threw over to first base three times to try and pick off George Springer. When the final throw over was unsuccessful, each runner was awarded a base, and that would be the Blue Jays’ lone run until Alejandro Kirk’s RBI single in the seventh.

After the loss at Wrigley, the Blue Jays sit 3 1/2 games back of the third and final Wild Card spot with 46 games remaining.