Homers and Pitching, Jays Beat Mariners

Blue Jays 4 Mariners 2

That was a much better game.

This is going to be a quick recap, because it is late and I’m tired.

Home runs were the order of the day for the good guys. We only managed 4 hits, but 3 of them were home runs. Kendrys Morales had a 2-run homer in the fourth (jumping us over the M’s for a 2-1 lead), Ezequiel Carrera had a solo shot in the eighth (giving us back the lead, at 3-2) (wouldn’t you know he’d have a big hit a day after I was so irratated by his rather terrible defense) and Justin Smoak, another solo shot in the 9th (giving us a much appreciated insurance run).

We did take 6 walks.

One of them turned out to be a lot of fun. In the 8th inning, with 2 out, Jose Bautista drew a walk and noticed no one was paying attention to him, so he took off for second and got there without a play. Most of you will remember Marco Scutaro doing the same thing, back on June 18, 2009. Both times, a very smart base running play. For Bautista, he got into scoring position, with 2 outs, at a time where we really would have loved an insurance run. Unfortunately Morales ground out to end the inning, but still a great play by Jose.

We needed and got another terrific start from Marcus Stroman. 7 innings, 6 hits, 2 runs , 1 earned, no walks and 6 strikeouts. The boxscore has Stroman at 12 groudouts and 1 flyout. He was terrific.

The Mariners scored a run on a throwing error by Russell Martin. Martin rushed a throw to second on a Jarrod Dyson steal, it went into center field and Kevin Pillar over ran the ball in center, allowing Dyson to score. I thought Tulo should have gotten his body in front of Russell’s throw.

Joe Smith pitched a scoreless 8th, despite a couple of hits and losing an out on a challenge at first base. Nelson Cruz grounded into what looked like a very needed double play but the call at first was overturned on review. It looked bad, the M’s had runners on the corners, but Smith got a strikeout and ground out, and we still had our 1-run lead.

Roberto Osuna pitched a quick, drama free 9th, for his 15th save.

Jays of the Day: Carrera (.286 WPA), Morales (.147), Smith (.135) and I’m giving one to Stroman (.088).

Suckage: Pillar had the number at -.107 and that doesn’t include over running the ball costing us the unearned run. He was 0 for 4, with a strikeout.

We had 496 comments in the GameThread. delv213 led us to victory. Great job.