The Jays got off to a mighty successful opening series against the Detroit Tigers, winning today's game 6-2 and taking the series 3 games to one.
For me, the big story of the day was the very impressive performance by Ricky Romero in his first big-league start. Romero went 6 strong and surrendered 2 runs, both in the third inning. Ricky struck out 5 and walked 2, got 9 groundball outs to three in the air, and generally looked very impressive on the mound, mixing his low 90s fastball with a two seamer, curve, change, and slider. Is he going to struggle at times? Sure, but he showed an impressive arsenal and impressive poise on the mound today.
Romero got the win but the Jays didn't win the game until he was, for all intents and purposes, done. A Michael Barrett single plated the first Jays run in the 4th, while Aaron Hill's second home run of the season tied the score in the 5th. In the Jays half of the 6th, Adam Lind lead off the inning with a bomb to left-centre field, giving the Jays the lead that they never would relinquish. Lind had a great day at the plate, going 3 for 4 and showing a great approach. Another Jay that looked good was Lyle Overbay, who went 2-3 with a walk, including a double over Curtis Granderson's head on a 3-2 pitch. And another was Travis Snider, who launched a double to right field that plated another Jays' run in the 6th. This was especially impressive because it came off a lefty, Nate Robertson, with 2 outs in the inning. Marco Scutaro then followed up with a 2-run home run off Juan Rincon, and that was all the runs that were scored in the game.
Romero exited after the 6th, but the Jays' excellent bullpen prevented the Tigers from getting back into it over the last third of the game. Carlson and League pitched the 7th and 8th and both looked sharp. Rince and I thought that B.J. Ryan would get a low pressure appearance, but Cito instead brought in Scott Downs to pitch the 9th and Snakeface was fantastic, striking out the side around a HBP.
So yeah, 4 games, and Doc and Litsch have surrendered 10 runs between the two of them while Romero and Purcey have both pitched quite well. That's a very good thing. The first-place Jays will say "hello, Cleveland!" this weekend and Scott Richmond hopes to turn his game up to 11 tomorrow afternoon when he takes the mound in opposition to southpaw Scott Lewis, the first portsider the Jays will face this season.
Oh - today's title provided by the fun Aussie band An Horse off their Rearrange Beds record. If you love Tegan and Sara, you will like An Horse a lot!