Jays drop third game in a row to fall seven games under .500

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Mathematically speaking, the Blue Jays remain in the hunt for a wild card spot in a woeful American League.

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Realistically speaking, each loss casts further doubt on the club’s playoff worthiness.

The club entered MLB’s all-star break having lost two straight in dropping a series to San Diego.

The club began its post-break schedule by losing to the visiting Chicago White Sox, 12-4.

Call them ChiSox, South Siders or Pale Hose, but these White Sox bear no resemblance to the sad-sack clubs of recent iterations.

The visitors jumped on the Jays quickly by scoring five runs in the second inning, and led 8-2 after the top of the fifth inning.

Friday night marked the first of 16 games for the Blue Jays heading into the Aug. 3 trade deadline, when many believe the Jays will be sellers.

A rethink will be in order if the club’s fortunes don’t turn and quickly.

The Jays’ upcoming opponents are the AL Central-leading White Sox, AL East-leading Tampa Bay Rays, the red-hot Boston Red Sox, and a Washington Nationals team hovering at .500.

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Three losses in a row does not inspire confidence, and neither does cementing one’s residency in the AL East basement.

Most disconcerting is the Jays are seven games below .500 to tie a season worst.

Based on their performance on Friday, the Jays are in danger of sinking even further into baseball’s abyss.

Regardless of how one cares to slice it and dissect it, this is not a good team, and the Jays have not been a good team for quite some time.

Can their lot in the AL change?

Anything, as they say, is possible, but signs of progress must be shown.

Friday night, continued signs of regression emerged.

The White Sox have surprised many in baseball and with the win they improved to 51-45.

The following are three takeaways from a horribly embarrassing loss by the Jays that dropped their record to 45-52 as their home record slipped to 25-25.

HOMERLESS, HAPLESS VLAD

A metaphorical turning of the page often gets mentioned when the unofficial start of the second half of a season begins.

For the Jays, the unofficial second half arrived Friday in the series opener of a three-game set.

Heading into the all-star break, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. had hit six home runs.

During the club’s 4-5 road trip to end the unofficial first half of the season, Vlad Jr. went deep twice during a three-game span.

None of his home runs have been hit at home, a trend that continued Friday as the Jays played their 50th home game of the season.

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Rookie Brandon Valenzuela hit his eighth homer of the season in the loss.

As for Vlad Jr., he went 1-for-4 on the night with one strikeout.

He batted second in the order.

Valenzuela hit in the bottom of the order, as did Luis Urias, who also went deep for his second homer of the season.

WHITE SOX GET TO MILES

One bad inning, in which he allowed five runs and five hits, bit Blue Jays starting pitcher Spencer Miles, who has been among the team’s best feel-good stories of the season.

Considering not many, even the most diehard of supporters, knew anything about the right-hander, Miles has come a long way since the club acquired him as a Rule 5 draft pick.

Miles was by no means putrid during his 60-pitch outing, but the second inning was hard to overlook, not to mention hard to overcome.

The White Sox had three successive hits to lead off the frame, which was capped off by a two-run homer from ChiSox leadoff hitter Sam Antonacci.

Miles did retire the White Sox in order in the first, third, and fourth innings.

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After Miles surrendered a leadoff hit to Chase Meidroth in the fifth inning, manager John Schneider had seen enough and summoned Adam Macko from the bullpen. Meidroth eventually scored as part of Chicago’s three-run inning.

Miles was charged with six earned runs, the most he has given up since May 31 in Baltimore, when he also gave up six runs.

In the ensuing 10 appearances across 23.0 innings, Miles had give up five earned runs.

The Blue Jays’ final pitcher of the game was CJ Van Eyk, who made his major-league debut and threw two runless innings.

NOTHING LEFT TO PROVE

For the first time since late September of last season, George Springer played an outfield position. To be more precise, he started in left field.

It’s hard to knock a veteran when he has been asked to serve primarily as a DH, but Springer did allow a ball in the gap to go all the way to the wall.

Mind you, it was sharply hit.

Back at cleanup in the lineup, Springer went deep in the fifth inning for a solo blast, his 10th of the season, to become only the second player on the Jays’ roster to reach double digits in dingers.

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The club leader is Kazuma Okamoto with 22.

Okamoto hit third in the lineup.

Okamoto is having a splendid first season with the Jays, his first in the majors.

Springer is in the final season of a six-year deal with the club.

His three-run homer in Game 7 of last year’s ALCS against Seattle will be etched in Blue Jays lore, Springer’s signature moment in Toronto.

With the Aug. 3 deadline ticking, it would seem Springer’s time with the Jays could be running out.

UP NEXT

In his last start, Shane Bieber threw a season-high 97 pitches in San Diego as the Jays won for the first time this season with the former Cy Young Award winner on the mound following three losses; Bieber’s fifth start of the season arrives Saturday (3:07 p.m. first pitch) when he will oppose fellow right-hander Davis Martin, who is aiming to earn his 10th win of the season.

fzicarelli@postmedia.com

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