Not discussing this one too much. The Jays threatened to put across a bunch of runs in the first inning but came away with just one, plated on an Edwin Encarnacion single. Mike McCoy probably shouldn't have been leading off. The Athletics answered right back with a run of their own in the bottom of the inning but Henderson Alvarez limited the damage. From there, the Jays offence disappeared, managing just two hits the rest of the way. They threatened to tie it in the top of the eighth, when John McDonald led off with a single and was bunted over to first by McCoy, but neither Yunel Escobar nor Eric Thames could cash him.
The A's plated a bit of a cheap run to take a 2-1 lead on a double play in the bottom of the fourth, after a groundball single and a rare Johnny Mac error. Alvarez managed to get through six and pitched well, 3 K, 1 BB, 7 H, just the two runs, and 11 grounders of 17 total batted balls. Jesse Litsch came on in relief in the seventh and looked shaky but escaped thanks to a nice play in right by McCoy. The wheels fell off in the eighth, though, Litsch got into trouble and, with one run already in and a runner on was lifted for Rommie Lewis to face a pinch hitting Josh Willingham. Willingham homered to put the game out of reach.
Notes: Jose Bautista was scratched due to a tight neck and Adam Lind was lifted due to injury resulting from a hit-by-pitch, but no word yet on how serious it is.
Jays of the Day: None, Encarnacion (.065) came closest. Honourable mention to Alvarez for looking really good out there.
Suckage Awards to pretty much the whole offence, but notably Yunel Escobar (-.181), Brett Lawrie (-.111), and Mike McCoy (-.091). I'm giving one to Rommie (-.047) because, even though the team was down by two when he came in, the homerun really was the nail in the coffin.
Thanks to Piebald for tonight's post title. It's an afternoon game tomorrow (finally), 4:00 eastern. Luis Perez starts against Guillermo Moscoso. Hopefully the bats wake up against Moscoso, whose peripherals (4.9 K/9, 3.27 BB/9, 27.2% gb-rate) don't exactly scream 1337.