That feels so much better.
We got a terrific start out of J.A. Happ. Who thought he could be this good? He gave us 6 shutout innings, allowed 7 hits, just 1 walk and 4 strikeouts. He was firing strikes. I really like this Happ. Special mention should be made of his 6th inning. He gave up back to back singles to Mike Napoli and Jonny Gomes and I really thought he was tiring. Two on, no outs and just a 1 run lead. But he got Shane Victorino to hit into a double play and struck out Stephen Drew. That was a big moment.
And we had a good day with the bats. 13 hits. 2 home runs (Jose Reyes and Dioner Navarro). A bunch of hard hit balls. Reyes (with a double to go along with the homer) and Melky Cabrera had 3 hits each. Jose Bautista, Navarro and Anthony Gose had 2 hits each. One of Anthony's was a very nice bunt single. The only ones in the starting lineup not to get a hit were Colby Rasmus, Juan Francisco and Munenori Kawasaki, and they each took a walk.
It took as a bit to get some runs. We got:
- 1 in the 3rd, Anthony Gose walked and stole second, Melky drove him in.
- 3 in the 6th. Reyes lead off with a home run. Melky followed with a ground rule double and then Navarro homered.
- 1 in the 7th. Gose put down a very nice bunt single. Reyes followed with a infield single and then they pulled off a double steal. Melky drove Gose in with an infield single. Bautista followed with a single to load the bases but Navarro hit into a double play.
- 2 in the 8th. Rasmus led off with a walk and stole second (his third of the season) and Ryan Goins drove him in. Gose followed with a single and Reyes hit a line drive double to score Goins.
I didn't think we were going to need all the runs. Dustin McGowan gave up a solo homer to David Ortiz, in the 8th, but all seemed good
Gibby brought Casey Janssen in in the 9th, even though it wasn't a save, and Casey had no end of troubles. Casey gave up a 2-run homer to Stephen Drew and then gave up two more base runners. I'm glad Gibby brought Brett Cecil in to face Ortiz with 2-out, 2 on. Cecil got him to hit a soft ground ball to third to end the game.
It was nice to see our offense work in so many different ways. Homers, doubles, infield hits, walks, bunt single and stolen bases.
We had some nice defense too. 2 double plays. Francisco started one on a nice play, grabbing a hard hit grounder, touching the bag at first and making a great throw to second. He looked very good first base. Kawasaki made a great, over-the-shoulder running catch on a popup down the right field line. He also made a couple of nice plays on ground balls, and was able to throw it across the infield. I wasn't sure he had enough arm.
Jays of the Day are Happ (.374 WPA) and Cabrera (.110). I'm giving an honorable mention to Navarro and Reyes. Gibby deserves an honorable mention too, he did a really nice job with the bullpen.
No Suckage Jays. I'm tempted to give one to Casey, because he had me considering taking up drinking as a full time job, but I'll give him a pass, figuring he is still getting over that 'flu like symptoms' thingy.
Source: FanGraphs
We had 1597 comments in the GameThread. Great job guys. Spor wins, but it was a tight one.
# | Commenter | # Comments |
---|---|---|
1 | Spor | 225 |
2 | Kraemer_17 | 204 |
3 | MapleMan | 147 |
4 | Pikachu | 130 |
5 | Strik3r | 129 |
6 | radivel | 84 |
7 | Alan F. | 84 |
8 | MjwW | 79 |
9 | Tom Dakers | 71 |
10 | jmarples | 62 |
11 | Belisarius | 54 |
12 | carpe.nocti | 42 |
13 | J.Bruce | 30 |
14 | Awayce | 29 |
15 | fishedin | 25 |
16 | Goldenhawk99 | 22 |
17 | MartsB | 20 |
18 | erik.t | 19 |
19 | e&n4e | 17 |
20 | Diamond_D86 | 16 |
21 | bluejays13 | 15 |
22 | Playoffs!!!!1 | 14 |
23 | Redonred | 13 |
24 | Torgen | 12 |
25 | hansdampf | 10 |
26 | bengrass | 10 |