Blue Jays 4 Rangers 3: Thank You Rajai!

Rangers 3 Blue Jays 4 (18 innings)

Three wins in a row!!

You just knew it would take an error to end that game and, thankfully, the Rangers made the error. Pitcher Ross Wolf threw wild on a pickoff attempt on Emilio Bonifacio, allowing Emilio to get to third, and Rajai Davis came through with the hit with the RISP we had been looking for for most of the afternoon.

Casey Janssen's first blown save of the season spoiled a great start from Mark Buehrle. Since that 7 run inning against the Rays, Buehrle's much much better. His ERA, after that game, was 7.02, now it is a much better looking 5.06. Mark gave up 4 hits, 2 walks, 3 strikeouts and 1 earned run, off a solo homer by Jeff Baker. When he's going well, he's great to watch. Steve Delabar pitched a scoreless 8th, then Janssen gave up two to blow the save. After that we'd see 6 more relievers:

• Dustin McGowan brought into a tie game in extras for his first appearance since his 5 games in 2011. Dustin walked the first batter, then got a double play ball, but Mark DeRosa booted it. A hit batter later and the bases were loaded. Dustin got a strikeout, then
• Juan Perez came in and gave up a medium fly to right. Fortunately, Jose Bautista has a great arm and made a perfect throw to cut down the runner at the plate. A great play. Juan pitched 2.0 innings, 1 hit, 1 walk, 1 k.
• Neil Wagner got 2 outs to end the 12th.
• Brett Cecil had a clean 12th, getting 1 k.
• Brad Lincoln pitched 4 very good innings, 1 hit, 1 walk, 2 hit batters, 3 k. I figured Gibby was leaving him in till the game ended or his arm fell off. But, instead..
• Aaron Loup gave up a hit, hit a batter but got out of the 18th without a run scoring.

On offense, we had 2 guys that could hit Yu Darvish. Adam Lind had 3 hits against him and Colby Rasmus 2. The rest couldn't. One of Colby's 2 hits was a 2-run triple and Colby scored a throwing error by Jurickson Profar.

After Darvish left, the Jays couldn't score against the Rangers bullpen for 10 innings, even with many chances. We had 2 on in the 11th. Runners on 1st and 2nd, with no outs, in the 13th. I really hate the sac bunt with a slow runner on second in that spot. Izturis put down a bad bunt, but he would have had to be perfect to move J.P. Arencibia up. I would have perfected a fake bunt, swing, like R.A. Dickey did against the Giants. n the 15 we had runners on the corners and no outs, but Rasmus popped up, Izturis ground out and Bonifacio lined out.

In total, in 18 innings, we had 15 hits and 5 walks. Lind was 4 for 7, Rasmus 3 for 8, Davis 2 for 4 (including the game winning), Arencibia 2 for 8 (with 3 strikeouts against Yu), Bonifacio 2 for 8.

JP did make a nice play in the 18th, picking David Murphy off second on a missed bunt attempt.

Jays of the Day: Lincoln (.570 WPA), Perez (.499), Buehrle (.297), Cecil (.143), Loup (.143 and the win), Wagner (.142), Davis (.223) and Rasmus (.141).

Suckage: Janssen (-.280), Izturis (-.367), DeRosa (-.183, plus the error), Thole (-.132)

Three guys had the number but I'm not giving them Suckage Awards: McGowan (-.213) but that was because of DeRosa's error. Bautista (-.155) but the throw from right to save the game saves him. Bonifacio (-.147) but he drew the wild pickoff throw and scored the winning run.

I had a long drive this afternoon, so I listened to the game on radio. My first time to hear Dirk Hayhurst doing commentary. I thought he was really good, he has a good sense of humor and is different than the normal former player turned analyst.

42 of you totaled 1362 comments in the thread today. rob.magnificent gutted out the win: