Ex-Blue Jays manager Gibbons weighs in on polarizing pitching pull
It’s been nearly a month since the Toronto Blue Jays’ season came to an end, but that hasn’t stopped the fan base from having a sour taste in their mouths about the way it ended.
During the team’s season-ending Game 2 loss to the Minnesota Twins in the American League Wild Card series, Toronto starting pitcher Jose Berrios was infamously pulled in the fourth inning in a 0-0 game just 47 pitches into his afternoon.
Replaced by Yusei Kikuchi in order to supposedly create a more favourable matchup against the Twins’ lineup, Toronto immediately allowed a pair of runs that would be the difference on the day as the Jays fell 2-0.
And while Toronto scored just one run across the two-game series, the decision by manager John Schneider to pull Berrios has remained a polarizing one among fans reflecting on the postseason.
Former Blue Jays manager John Gibbons visited the team subreddit on Wednesday afternoon for a Reddit Ask Me Anything thread, where he was asked about what he would’ve done in that situation.
“Would not have had the guts to pull him,” Gibbons said. “It had to have been the game plan and everyone signed off on it, reluctantly I’m sure.”
Gibbons managed Toronto from 2004-2008, and came back for a second stint from 2013-2018, making the playoffs twice in 2015 and 2016.
In the days following the Jays’ loss this year, there was plenty of finger-pointing as to who made the final call on pulling Berrios — was it actually Schneider’s, or was it a decision handed down on him by either the front office or an analytics staffer?
Toronto general manager Ross Atkins stated that the call was Schneider’s and his staff, although he drew criticism from many fans and media for not claiming some responsibility for the move.
“As it relates to the meeting, those meetings are John Schneider’s meetings,” Atkins said in his end-of-season press conference. “He has a group of individuals that he prepares with every day. His process, routine, his preparation was no different that day. The group is the staff that’s on the field. It’s not the front office. I do not attend these meetings, and I certainly do not make those decisions. When that decision occurred, I found out about it when you did.”
Gibbons echoed Atkins’ comments, saying that he was allowed to manage games how he wanted while in Toronto, including his years under Atkins and Toronto president Mark Shapiro from 2016 until he was let go following the 2018 season.
“Zero [influence from the front office]. They let me do my own thing, which I can’t complain,” Gibbons said in a series of answers. “None of them influence my decisions. Now we always discussed the games afterwards and personnel matters beforehand, but they all let me do my job. Now, at the end, I’m sure they wished I would have taken a little more input.”
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