Blue Jays 2 Orioles 3
Still 4.5 games up on the Yankees, in spite of being told that’s a must-win game.
I only want to talk about the top of the ninth. Down one. Corbin Martin into the game. He hits Ernie Clement with a pitch (on the hand/arm, looked painful). That would have made the count 3-1 if it hadn’t hit him.
Next up, Tyler Heineman walks on four pitches. Only one of them was anywhere close to the zone.
So, never batter, Myles Straw is told to bunt. I’m not a big fan of Straw, but he can watch four pitches wide of the zone as well as anyone. But no, he bunts, letting Martin off the hook. I hate sac bunts, but in this case, read the game going on in front of you.
Good bunt. Straw does bunt well.
One out, runners on second and third. One of the reasons I hate the bunt is that it puts a ton of pressure on the next hitter. In this case, Nathan Lukes who is hitting .205 over the past two weeks. He strikes out looking at a pitch on the edge of the strikeout box. One you can’t take in this spot. You need to make contact.
Then it is all on Bo. He’s been good with RISP (in the back of my head, I think that isn’t a skill and is likely to correct). He gets to a full count and then chases a pitch nearly head high. Ball game.
The bunt let Martin off the hook and gave him time to find the zone.
Beyond that, Eric Lauer went five innings, giving up five hits, two earned, one walk and four strikeouts. He was good. Out at 77 pitches, but he looked like he was tiring that last inning.
Yariel Rodriguez pitched a scoreless inning, with one walk.
Seranthony Domínguez pitched a clean inning, with two strikeouts, just a couple of hours after being traded to us.
Jeff Hoffman gave up the winning run in the eighth. With one out, Gunnar Henderson hit a hard double to right. Next batter, Adley Rutschman, hit a ball hard to right, Lukes really should have caught it. Outfielders are taught go back to the wall, and then figure things out. Lukes drifted towards the wall, jumped while still a bit away from the wall and missed. It wasn’t an easy play, but it was one a good outfield should make.
Anyway, run scores. After that, hit batter, ground out, strikeout.
Hoffman had those two hard hits; it is on him, but sometimes the fielders ought to help him out.
We had eight hits.
We scored one in the second: Clement and Heineman led off with singles. Then Straw bunted them to second and third. I hate early game bunts. If you play for one run, that’s all you will get. And scoring one run in the second rarely wins you a game.
And one in the fourth: Clement and Heineman (again) had one-out singles this time, giving us runners on the corners. This time, Straw didn’t bunt, ground out, force out at second, and run scores.
We had eight hits (plus five walks, but the top of the order, Lukes, Bichette and Guerrero went 0 for 12 (with two walks). Bo had three strikeouts. Wagner and Straw also had 0 fors.
Clement (two) and Heineman (three) had five hits and one walk between them. Barger had two hits.
Our defense wasn’t as sharp as usual. Lukes had issues in right. Wagner dropped a grounder hit at him (no error, he still got the out at first, but could have had the out at second.
Lukes also had a weird play, fly ball to left (he started the game in left), bounced off the top of the wall and went over his head and along the right field wall. Straw finally corralled it, but it was a triple. No fault on Lukes, just a weird feature of the park.
Jays of the Day: Heineman (.349 WPS) and Clement (.161). Let’s give one to Dominguez and Rodriguez.
Other Award: Bo (-.426), Lukes (-.255), Wagner (-.378) and Hoffman (-.238).
Tomorrow, the sun will still come out. We’ll still be in first. We have a game at 12:30 Eastern. Berrios (7-4, 3.83) vs. Dean Kremer (8-7, 4.23).