Surprise, Intentionally Walking Someone to Face Evan Longoria Was a Bad Move, Who Would Have Known?

Blue Jays 0 Rays 3

Honestly, that must have been the dumbest move of the season, and we've seen a lot of dumb moves. To recap it, Demond Jennings is on first, one out. He steals second, so Farrell chooses to walk Ben Zobrist to face Evan Longoria with 2 on. Now, not trying to knock Ben Zobrist, Ben is a pretty good player. But, Evan Longoria is one of the best players in the game.

It worked about as well as you would imagine it would. Longoria hit a opposite field double off the wall. Taking us from a 1-0 game to a 3-0 game. Then Farrell takes Brandon Lyon out of the game. Like it is his fault.

Chad Jenkins gave us a really nice start. 5 innings, just 2 hits, 1 walk and 4 strikeouts. The blemish, and the reason he gets the L, was a home run ball served up to B.J. Upton. Since the Jays gave up a couple of dozen runs against the Rays the last couple of days, allowing just 1 in 5 innings is quite the feat.

Steve Delabar did a nice job in relief. getting 4 outs, 3 of them strikeouts. Darren Oliver got 2 outs without allowing a run. Then the above happened.

On offense, we couldn't score. We had chances. We had 7 hits, 3 hits (plus a walk) from Yunel Escobar, 2 hits (including a pop fly double). for Anthony Gose.

Gose could have got us a run. In the 7th, he hit a pop up that fell between the center fielder and the two middle infielders. Gose went for second and was just barely safe, when the throw to second was dropped by Evan Longoria. Gose could have gone to third, there was no one there and Brian Butterfield was yelling for him to go, but he was cleaning himself off from the slide into second. Brett Lawrie hit a fly out that was just deep enough to move Gose from 2nd to 3rd, but we could get him home from there. Had he gone to 3rd on the pop up, he could have scored on Lawrie's fly out. Oh well.

Day of the Day, by the numbers goes to Yunel (.156 WPA). Gose was close with .091 WPA. Jenkins had a .081, but I'm going to give him a JoD, because he pitched so well. Suckage goes too Lawrie (-.185), Sierra (-.157), Johnson (-.154), Rasmus (-.131), Arencibia (-.124). Lyon had the number as well but I'm charging that Suckage Award to Farrell.

Rasmus almost tied it for us. With Gose on 3rd, with 2 out in the 7th, Colby hit a soft one short of the second baseman. Pitcher J.P. Howell made a great play getting to the ball and making a throw, while flying through the air, to first, just getting Colby out. Colby also made a great catch against the CF wall in the first inning.

Another Farrell moment I didn't like, came in the 5th inning. Yunel lead off with a single and Farrell had Kelly bunt. Kelly singled earlier in the game, but following Kelly was Moises Sierra and Anthony Gose. I would have rather not put the pressure on them to come through with the runner at second. Sierra struck out,Gose did get an infield single but Lawrie struck out after a long at bat.

Tomorrow we have a double-header against the Orioles. Henderson Alvarez (9-13, 4.87) starts the first game,a 4:00 Eastern start, then Ricky Romero (8-14, 5.72) starts the late game. Let's win at least one please.