Blue Jays 10 Rangers 3
This is the way we hope the season will go. If teams don't want to pitch to Jose Bautista, Adam Lind makes them pay. In the first, the Jays loaded the bases and Lind hit a single. He led off the 3rd inning with an opposite field homer. And in the 4th he pulled a pitch for a 3 run homer. 5 RBI in all for Adam.
It was nice to see us score a bunch in the first inning. 5 runs was a nice start. Then 5 more between the 3rd and 4th inning and the game was in hand. Everyone in the lineup had at least 1 hit except for Mike McCoy, who was robbed on a hard hit ball to the track. Corey Patterson had 2 hits, a bunt single in the first and a double. Juan Rivera had 2 singles and 2 runs. He also went 1st to 3rd on a single to left field. I figured he would be happy to pull up at 2nd. He read the play really well. Nice to have him swinging the bat well again. Jose Bautista had a double and 2 walks and scored twice.
We had 12 hits and 5 walks all told. Nice to see them take some walks. Also good to see them have a plan against a pitcher that was doing well, if a bit lucky, up to this game. They seemed to know that Harrison liked to get ahead with the fastball and when they got it they hit it hard.
Jesse Litsch looked good in his first game back. 6 innings, 7 hits, 2 walks, 1 k and 3 earned. 9 ground outs to 4 fly outs. All 3 runs came in the second inning. Jose misplayed a fly ball hit his way. Not sure if he didn't see it off the bat or if he just didn't know where it was going but it was very catchable. On the next batter, Litsch got unlucky on a pitch that should have been strike 3 but was called a ball. If it was called a strike, he would have been out of the inning. As it was, the at bat finished with a single. Two more hits later and the Rangers had 3 runs. Only 1 k for Jesse but then he didn't need to strike guys out for the win today.
Casey Janssen, Frank Francisco and Shawn Camp pitch the last 3 scoreless innings. Camp make it interesting in the 9th, giving up two hits and having runners on the corners before getting a game ending DP.
Jays of the Day are Lind (.222 WPA) and J.P. (.104). Rivera, Patterson and Bautista deserve honorable mention. Litsch surprisingly had a -.051 WPA, mostly for the 3 runs that scored in the 2nd to make the game close again. After that the Jays got 5 more runs and Litsch could do nothing to get his number up.
There was a little bit of small ball, to go with the homers. Patterson beat out a bunt single, in the 1st, after Escobar started the game with a single. John McDonald stole 2nd base, helped by a nice slide. Rivera had that nice 1st to 3rd, likely taking advantage of an outfielder that didn't think he would try for it. A couple of batters later, Arencibia was thrown out trying to do the same.
With just 2 strikeouts total for the Jays, there were some nice plays made behind him. We turned a couple of double plays and had a couple of line drives caught by infielders. Adam Lind made a very impressive plays at first.
Tomorrow Jo-Jo Reyes gets the start tomorrow. Another lefty, Derek Holland (3-1, 4.39) starts for the Rangers.
One of those perfect days, Jays win and both the Red Sox and Yankees lose. These days don't happen often enough.