The Kevin Gregg Appreciation Society Recap: Jays Beat Orioles

Orioles 2 Blue Jays 9

Boy, it is nice to see some offense. All our batters needed was a dose of Kevin Gregg.

Also, nice to see Kyle Drabek have his second good start in a row, to greet the new season. Today, 7.1 innings, 6 hits, 2 runs, 1 earned (the other got on base because his own error), 1 walk and 6 strikeouts. The only real black mark was an Adam Jones home run. Even his defense, minus missing the catch at first base (the throw wasn't perfect from Edwin Encarnacion, Kyle seemed to look down to see where the base was at the same moment the ball got to him), looked good. He started one double play and made another nice play on a ground ball.

And our offense had a great day too, well, at least when Gregg got into the game. Until then it was close. Brian Matusz was good slash lucky for 5 innings. He only allowed 1 run, a Lawrie homer, before the 6th. He was helped out by 3 double plays, one on a very hard hit Colby Rasmus line drive, right into the glove of first baseman Chris Davis. Ben Francisco, who led off the inning with a double, was a little too far off second (not really his fault) and was doubled off.

Then in the 6th Jose Bautista doubled and Edwin hit a laser shot out over the left field wall. It got out in a hurry. A ground out and a Francisco single ended Matusz day. Thankfully, Buck Showalter brought in our old friend Gregg. He got a strikeout, then gave up a single, two doubles, 2 walks, and a hit batter before he finally got the last out of the inning. We scored 7 runs, our best inning of the season. The only reason, that I can see, to leave Gregg in that long, is that the Orioles were going to release him after the game anyway.

We got 1 more run in the 8th, a hard hit double by Edwin (when he is hot, he's as good as any hitter around) and a Brett Lawrie single.

Jays of the Day: Edwin (.217 WPA, 2 for 4, double, homer, walk and not a terrible job at first base), Jeff Mathis (.136 WPA, 2 for 3, double that could have been called an error off Adam Jones glove, walk), Francisco (.113, 2 for 3, double, walk) and I'm going to give one to Drabek (.089 WPA, a great start). Honorable mention to Yunel (3 for 5, double, and started perhaps the nicest DP we've had this year), Lawrie (2 for 4, HR) and Jose (1 for 4, walk, double that started our big 6th inning.

Rasmus (-.173) and Johnson (-.114) have suckage numbers but after a nice win, I don't have the heart to give them the awards. Rasmus gets most of his negative number for that line out double play and that was just bad luck, he hit it about as good as a person could. And Kelly? He made a couple of amazing plays on defense.

Also of note, Evan Crawford got into his first major league game, pitching a scoreless 9th, allowing a hit and getting a strikeout. Very nice for him, he got to get all the high fives at the end of the game. He looked good out there too, though, down by 7, I'm not sure the O's really had their hearts in it.

Great game. We needed a blow out. Tomorrow is an off-day, then the Rays come to town starting Tuesday night. Tuesday will also be the debut of SB Nation's new game, Pick 6. We'll have a post up about it tomorrow, but it looks great fun and will give us some fun, competing against each other in a daily game.

Thanks to Nadia for the post title. Has Gregg been released yet?