The Jays beat the Reds 5-4 this afternoon in Dunedin when Curtis Thigpen lead off the 10th inning with a home run. Nothing better than an extra-inning game winning HR, which made me think of the great song Alex Chilton, by the Replacements, from whence comes the title.
Brad Mills started today, and did a decent job. He gave up 2 runs in 4 innings on 4 hits and an unfortunate 4 walks. He wasn't helped when Joe Inglett, playing SS, was unable to turn a ground ball into a double play in the 4th inning. Mills had some trouble after that and ended up walking in a run. Mills was supposed to go 5 innings but ran out of pitches, so it wasn't an entirely successful outing. That said, Mills blanked the Reds until the 4th, and did limit the damage that inning, so it wasn't too bad. Torgen hypothesized that Mills will get sent to the minors after this start, and that wouldn't surprise me. As rince reported, the options for the rotation are paring down and it is looking like it's down to Casey Janssen, Matt Clement, and Scott Richmond, which to me it always did.
Dirk Hayhurst followed Mills and had yet another great inning, striking out the side around a Joey Votto double. In 7 innings, Dirk has given up 5 hits and no runs, and even better, has struck out 12 while walking no one. A great performance thusfar.
Jason Frasor came in after Hayhurst and wasn't good at all, giving up two runs on a couple of hits and walk. After Frasor, things got better. Shawn Camp, Brandon League, Jesse Carlson, and Adrian Martin all pitched scoreless innings. They were all good - Camp got two groundouts and had a K and no hits or walks, League walked one in his inning but struck out the side, Carlson gave up no hits/walks and had two strikeouts of his own, and Martin pitched the 10th inning for the win. Good to see League and Carlson out there and pitching effectively.
At the plate, Rince will be thrilled that his man Jason Lane hit yet another home run for his 4th of the spring. We already mentioned Thigpen's home run, but he also singled in the game. With Michael Barrett having another 0-fer, Thigpen could be making his case. Pitchers like throwing to him and he certainly hits better than Raul Chavez. I don't see the Jays going in that direction, though. Russ Adams had another hit and walk day, Travis Snider had a double, Jose Bautista had three hits, and Scott Campbell had a quality day at the plate with two singles, including his 7th RBI of the spring.
On defense, of course I didn't see it, but Barrett stopped an attempted larceny. We talked about Joe Inglett's difficulties at short, but they were nothing compared to Angel Sanchez, who made 3 errors, ugly.