TORONTO -- The basic and fundamental act of communicating in the outfield is something that the Toronto Blue Jays have struggled with far too often this season, and it cost them in a big way Thursday night.
A soft popper bound for Jose Bautista's glove was disrupted by a hard-charging Corey Patterson causing the ball to drop in to start the sixth inning, and the miscue set the stage for a three-run explosion that sullied Brett Cecil's return to the majors and led to a 6-2 Pittsburgh Pirates victory.
The mix-up in short left field, coming immediately after the Blue Jays (40-42) had erased a 2-0 deficit with a pair of solo shots, left Lyle Overbay at third base, and things devolved quickly from there.
Light-hitting Ronny Cedeno followed with an RBI double to put the Pirates (41-39) back out in front and Brandon Wood followed with a two-run blast that opened up a 5-2 edge before a disappointed crowd of 14,939.
That messiness essentially sealed a third loss in four games for the Blue Jays, ahead of what should be an emotional and difficult interleague series with former ace Roy Halladay and the Philadelphia Phillies.
"The ball was credited a hit, I would have gladly taken an error for him, one of us should have got it, that play should be made 100 out of 100 times," said Bautista, adding he didn't hear Patterson's call for the ball. "That opened up a big inning for them. (Cecil) was pitching great, we've got to make those kind of plays, there's nothing else to it."
The play was the latest miscommunication involving Patterson -- on Sunday he and Juan Rivera both pulled up on a catchable ball in St. Louis that went for an Andrew Brown double, while on June 17 at Cincinnati, he and Bautista both stopped short on a ball in the outfield that led to a Drew Stubbs inside the park homer.
Manager John Farrell said the Blue Jays have been "pointed" in telling Patterson to be more aggressive chasing down balls, and the previous incidents were on his mind as the outfielder went after Overbay's blooper.
"I assumed it would be a tough play for Jose … but talking to a couple of teammates, he was camped under the ball. I didn't know," said Patterson. "I didn't want to take the chance of looking at him and him looking at me. I've done that one or two times in the outfield and the ball dropped in the gap. That's the last thing I wanted to happen."
Farrell said the coaching staff has been teaching the players how to direct traffic on such plays since spring training and would continue to work with them in the wake of the latest slipup.
Asked whose ball it should have been, he said Patterson.
"When you have outfielders and infielders converging, the outfielder coming into the play always has priority," he said. "I know (Patterson) called for it, obviously in this case he didn't hear him loud enough to clear out of the way and give him the right of way.
"There was not the clarity of communication that there needs to be."
Cecil (1-3), making his first start in the majors since getting thumped by the New York Yankees on April 20, proceeded to escape the sixth without further damage but came out of the game after a one-out double by Andrew McCutchen in the seventh.
McCutchen came around on a Matt Diaz single off Octavio Dotel, leaving the young left-hander with a pitching line of six runs in 6.1 innings which wasn't indicative of how he threw the ball.
"I felt like I pitched a lot better than the line showed," said Cecil. "It was just a mistake behind third and the floodgates open.
"I'm looking for a shut-down inning so the guys can get back in there and get after the bats pretty quickly. I thought I was off to a good start but mistakes happen, I make them, everybody makes them and I'm still the one making the pitches after that. It was tough luck."
Regularly hitting 93 on the radar gun, Cecil looked much stronger than he did earlier in the season, regularly overpowering the Pirates.
Still, they bled him for a run in the first when Alex Presley tripled and scored on McCutchen's groundout, and another in the fifth when Josh Harrison's blooper was played into a double by Rajai Davis in centre field, Michael McKenry sacrificed him over and Presley's fly ball brought him in.
The Blue Jays replied in the fifth against Jeff Karstens (6-4) on solo shots by J.P. Arencibia and Yunel Escobar, but the lead was short-lived. Karstens lives both dangerously and fortunately, having now allowed 16 home runs this season, 15 of them with no one aboard.
He kept that run going by allowing just five hits and a walk in seven innings, with the Blue Jays threatening a big inning only once, in the first when they put runners on the corners with none out. But Yunel Escobar was thrown out at home trying to score on Bautista's grounder to first and Adam Lind followed by hitting into a double play.
Poor outfield defence also bit the Blue Jays in a series-opening loss to the Pirates on Tuesday when a blooper bounced over Eric Thames in right field and past Patterson, who was backing up the play but in poor position do so.
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SNIDER RETURNS: Outfielder Travis Snider received clearance to return from his concussion Thursday and was back in the lineup at DH for triple-A Las Vegas as the 51s hosted Colorado Springs.
Snider was injured when he was hit on the ball of the helmet by a pitch nearly two weeks ago. He will play centre field at Vegas and could be called up to the majors once he has his timing back.
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INJURY NOTES: Reliever Casey Janssen, working his way back from forearm tightness, is scheduled to pitch in a game for single-A Dunedin this weekend. … Right-hander Dustin McGowan will start a rehabilitation assignment Saturday with Dunedin and will pitch two innings. He will progress to three innings after two starts, pitching every five days.
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