OAKLAND -- After spending his first five Major League seasons patrolling the infield in Oakland, Matt Chapman is quite familiar with the spacious confines of the Coliseum. This week, though, he's spent much of his time in a place that's unfamiliar to him: the visitors' clubhouse.
Now a mainstay at third base in Toronto, Chapman made his first return trip to Oakland since being dealt to the Blue Jays before the 2022 season. He received a warm ovation from the home crowd in Monday's series opener and even took his first stroll up to the plate to the tune of "Antidote" by Travis Scott, one of his walk-up songs while with the A's.
After all the buzz, Chapman went 0-for-3 with a strikeout in the opener, but he turned things around in the stadium he used to call home on Tuesday, recording a three-hit night in the Blue Jays' 5-3 loss to the A's.
Chapman snapped an 0-for-16 streak with his first hit, a two-run homer to center in the second inning. He followed that up with a pair of base hits in his next two at-bats, to the cheers of some of the Oakland faithful in attendance.
"I really wanted to come out of there with the win today, but it felt good to hit a homer and have some success here for sure," Chapman said. "It's cool that the fans still love me, and I loved my time here. I think there will always be a connection."
The Blue Jays swung the bat well on Tuesday, notching 10 hits against A's pitching. But with the exception of Chapman and Teoscar Hernández, who also homered, they were left searching for the big hit they needed to go ahead. The Blue Jays left five runners on base, struggling to come through in key moments.
One such missed opportunity came in the sixth inning, when Alejandro Kirk and Hernández led off the frame with back-to-back singles against A's starter Adrián Martínez. That set up a battle between A's lefty A.J. Puk and Vladimir Guerrero Jr., who came off the bench during a planned day off to pinch-hit for Cavan Biggio. Guerrero just missed the first pitch he saw, flying out to left field.
Then Chapman came to the plate for the third time that evening. He laid down a single in left-center field that should have safely loaded the bases with one out. Instead, Kirk was waved home and easily thrown out at the plate on a 7-4-2 relay. The next batter, Raimel Tapia, struck out to kill the rally.
"We haven't done the little things," manager Charlie Montoyo said. "We're one of the best hitting teams in baseball. The last five games, we have faced some good pitching, and then trying to catch up in every game -- everybody's pressing a little bit more."
Three runs may have been enough for the Blue Jays to eke out a win if things had gone better on the other side of the ball. Yusei Kikuchi, who struck out eight in an especially strong outing last Thursday in Toronto, couldn't make it out of the third inning in Oakland, issuing a season-high five free passes.
Kikuchi wasn't the only Blue Jays pitcher to struggle with command -- Toronto pitchers combined to allow a season-high-tying eight walks on Tuesday night.
"It's tough to play behind somebody who's not throwing strikes, and that kind of puts you behind the eight ball from the beginning," Montoyo said. "Our offense is good enough to come back in any game, but lately it seems like we've been trying to catch up every game."
Montoyo has repeatedly cited two issues that have afflicted the Blue Jays during their current five-game losing streak, which tied a season high. First, the rotation has struggled, leaving the worn-out bullpen to pick up more innings. And second, the lineup is trying to do too much at the plate.
Chapman, who has had a somewhat slow start to his Blue Jays career so far, expressed a similar sentiment in his first media session back in Oakland. He said he had initially put too much pressure on himself to make a statement in Toronto, and it took some time for him to relax and begin playing more like he normally does.
Perhaps the same is true for the scuffling Blue Jays.
"We have a lot of talented players that are capable of doing big things," Chapman said, "so maybe it's one of the things where we're trying to do too much, go up there trying to hit homers or whatever it is, instead of just taking what we can get and counting on the next guy to pick you up.
"There's a lot of talent, and I think sometimes maybe we can think too big instead of maybe just doing your part."