Schneider on Manoah: 'I don’t think it was a step backwards'

Toronto Blue Jays manager John Schneider told reporters after Tuesday's loss that he thought Alek Manoah didn't regress in his latest outing.

Manoah allowed four earned runs in three innings in an eventual 9-1 loss to the San Diego Padres. He conceded four hits, including a two-run home run to Juan Soto in the first inning, and walked five with no strikeouts.

“I don’t think it was a step backwards,” Schneider said via MLB.com's Keegan Matheson. “All of the things we’ve been talking about him improving on, I thought he continued to do so tonight.”

“I thought the line looked worse than it really was,” Schneider said. “A couple of close pitches he didn’t get, and that team does damage. I thought he got ahead of hitters but had a tough time putting them away. He was probably trying to be a bit too fine, so his pitch count got driven up.”

One of those pitches came with two strikes when he didn't get the call on a changeup at the bottom of the zone. Later in the at-bat, Soto launched a two-run shot over the left centre field wall to give the Padres an early lead.

After another close strike call went against Toronto, pitching coach Pete Walker came out to talk with Manoah. Home-plate umpire Malachi Moore went to the mound to break up the conversation and ejected Walker while he appeared to be speaking with Manoah. Walker then turned his attention to Moore and continued to voice his displeasure.

Manoah said he didn't hear anything he thinks should have gotten Walker turfed.

“I don’t think anything Pete said would have gotten you kicked out of a 10-year-old travel ballpark,” Manoah said.

“I don’t know what he said before. I don’t know what the history is there. I really don’t know. I just know that he was talking to me and said, ‘There were a couple calls that didn’t go our way. Don’t worry about that. Keep pitching. I’ll handle everything else.’ Next thing you know, he was tossed.”

The start raised Manoah's season ERA to 6.18 and was a far cry from his outing against the Detroit Tigers before the All-Star Break when he allowed one run over six innings. It was his first start at the big-league level in over a month.

Manoah was optioned to the Florida Complex League on June 6 after allowing eight of the nine Houston Astros’ hitters he faced to reach base in a start the day before.

The 25-year-old pitched to a 2.24 ERA in 196.2 innings last season, finishing third in American League Cy Young voting.

Toronto will continue its series with San Diego Wednesday night with Jose Berrios taking the hill against Yu Darvish.