Travis Snider had a great game in his first game back. 2 for 3 with a walk and homer, 2 runs and an RBI. Cito I know you think you are protecting the guy but let's move him out of 9th in the order. Soon. Tomorrow for example. He looked great at the plate. His out was a strikeout.
Beyond that? Who cares. Well, if you want to know, Randy Ruiz hit his 3rd homer and Rod Barajas had one as well. Everyone in the line up had at least one hit and our little power slump is over since we hit 3 homer and 4 doubles. 2 for Aaron Hill and 1 each for Vernon Wells and Adam Lind.
Pitching and defense let us down tonight. Ricky Romero only lasted 3.2 innings, giving up 8 hits, 6 runs, 5 earned, walked 3 and struck out 2. Camp pitched a good 1.2 innings, giving up a homer but that's all. Jesse Carlson got the 2 outs asked of him. Casey Janssen pitched a perfect 7th striking out 2. But coming back out in the 8th he gave up a single, a walk and made an error on an Alex Gonzalez bunt attempt (our 2nd missplayed bunt of the game, guys, when they give you an out, that it). Brian Tallet came in and allowed the two runners Janssen left on score and we were down by 3 runs. Jason Frasor a scoreless 9th.
We did make an attempted come back with a 2 out rally in the 8th that scored 2 runs to bring it back to a 1 run game. We did get the tying run to second in the 9th off a Jonathan Papelbon.
Just to show all is not sunny having Snider back. He did make a bad error in the 4th, missing a very catchable ball in right. I'm not sure how much right field he's played in the minors. But it was great to see the team score some runs and with his and Randy Ruiz' power the last month and a half of the season should be great fun.
Jays of the Day are Snider (.153), Hill (.131) and Barajas (.106). Suckage Jays Romero (-.379), Janssen (-.285), Wells (-.157) and Lind (-.142).
Tomorrow Roy Halladay (13-5, 2.65) goes against Clay Buchholtz (1-3, 4.45) It should be interested as Buchholtz was rumored to be the main piece of a possible Halladay trade to the Sox. And Travis Snider will be playing again.
The game thread was great fun again tonight. Hugo asked an interesting question that I couldn't come up with an answer to: Has JP released or given a guy away in a trade who has hit it big somewhere else? Now we aren't talking about guys that left as free agents or ones traded in normal trades that we expected each team to gain something. Generally any GM that has worked for a few years has that guy that they got rid of thinking he had no value and he turns into something. Anyway I couldn't come up with anyone off the top of my head.Anyone got someone? The closest I could think of was Brandon Lyon and he wasn't terrific. No it doesn't mean that he's a great GM if there isn't, just kind of an interesting question.