Travis and Maile homer, Jays beat Reds 5-4

Reds 4 Blue Jays 5

Sweeps are great. 18-10 months are great too.

It seemed like we had the game and then, it seemed like we didn’t, but Roberto saved us. 1 out, 1 on, in the 9th and a perfect double play ball to Ryan Goins and he has it go right through him. That would have won the game, and it was an easy play. Instead we had runners on the corners and 1 out. When the runner on first stole second, it looked really bad. I should always trust Roberto Osuna (who gave up a leadoff homer to make it a 1-run game), he struck out Billy Hamilton and Zack Cozart. Thank you, Robert.

It seems right that, on the last day of a great month for Devon Travis, he gets the big hit, a 2-run homer in the 7th. I didn’t think it was going to go, he got a lot of height on it, but it cleared the wall easy.

Luke Maile had our other homer, also a 2-run shot, back in the 5th inning, to tie the game at 3.

Our other run was on a Kendrys Morales sac fly.

We didn’t have all that much for offense, just 7 hits. Ezequiel was the only Jay with 2 hits. We had 3 walks, 2 of them from Ryan Goins.

In a game where we needed Mike Bolsinger to pitch us some innings, he went 5.1. He allowed 4 hits, 4 walks, 3 earned, with 7 strikeouts. Other than all the walks, that’s about the best we could hope from Bolsinger. When he gave up the Votto homer in the first, I thought it was going to be a long day. That was likely his last start for us, at least for now, as Francisco Liriano is back this weekend.

Our bullpen was terrific:

• Aaron Loup came into the 6th inning, with 2 on and 1 out and got out of the inning without allowing either runner to score, getting 2 strikeouts.
• Jason Grilli pitched a scoreless 7th, giving up just an infield single and getting 1 strikeout. He’s had a couple of good appearances in a row.
• Joe Smith pitched a clean 8th, with 2 strikeouts.
• And Roberto Osuna.....kept us interested. He gave up the leadoff homer, and then a 1 -out single. He should have been out of the inning, getting an easy double play ball but Goins missed it. But Roberto got 2 strikeouts to end the game, getting his 11th save.

We had 15 strikeouts on the day. Our bullpen is really coming together. If Loup and Grilli can continue pitching well, life will be good.

There was a couple of interesting moments. Ezequiel showed us why I hate fly balls hit in his direction. He leaped at a ball at the fence and missed it by 5 feet. And Russell Martin was picked off second base, one of those things that should never happen. Martin also seemed to hurt his knee or ankle swinging at a pitch but he stayed in the game.

Gibby rested 3 of our regulars: Donaldson, Tulowitzki and Pillar, and had Martin playing third. So, the win seems extra nice. I’m all for giving guys rest. We’ve had too many injuries, I’d like Gibby to err on the side of caution.

Jays of the Day: Travis (.204 WPA, batting leadoff), Loup (.130) and Maile (.126). I’m also giving one to Roberto for getting out of the 9th after that error. Goins had the number .155 but that doesn’t include the error, so I’m not giving him one. But he was 1 for 2 with 2 walks.

Suckage: Bolsinger (-.135), Martin (-.098, plus the pickoff), Morales (-.097, 0 for 3, k and sac fly) and Smoak (-.081).

We had 722 comments in the GameThread. Dennis in Tokyo led us to the win. Great job.