Too Many Balls Hit Into the Estratosphere, Jays Phail to Sweep Phillies

Phillies: 8 Blue Jays: 3

The game started out well, as Marco Estrada stuck out César Hernández on four pitches. That didn’t last long. He gave up back to back bombs to Rhys Hoskins and Carlos Santana, then a hard hit single to Wilson Ramos and a ground rule double to Nick Williams. After a brief visit from Pete Walker, Estrada sandwiched a walk between two outs and was able to escape the inning without any further damage. He threw 30 pitches in the inning.

The second inning wasn’t much better. Estrada walked the first two batters and fell behind Hoskins 3-0 before getting him to pop up. He retired Santana, but Ramos hit a ball that dropped just inside the first base line and a third run scored.

The third inning was more of the same. A lead off Asdrubal Cabrera double followed by another homer and subsequent walk, and Marco’s day, much like his trade value, was toast. Justin Shafer came in and got all three outs without allowing another run to score.

Shafer pitched a clean 4th and 5th inning, the first scoreless innings of the game.

Tim Mayza pitched the 6th, allowing a walk and a single but no runs.

Jake Petricka was handed the 7th, and allowed two hits but no runs.

Tyler Clippard pitched the 8th, and he was pretty terrible. He put two on with no outs, allowing the first run to score on a sac fly. Then Ramos hit a two run homer to put the game out of reach. Joe Biagini came in to get the final two outs.
Biagini also pitched a scoreless 9th, with a hit erased on a double play.

Offensively, the Jays seemed to falter against Vince Velasquez, who really struggled with his command. They had lead off walks in the first two innings, but couldn’t advance them past first base. The third inning was a different story. Billy McKinney doubled, and Kendrys Morales homered for a 7th straight game. This makes eight homers in seven games for him, setting a Blue Jays franchise record, and a 2018 MLB record. Truly remarkable.

The Jays put two on with one out in the 5th, but couldn’t score. Same goes with the 6th, which included Randal Grichuk getting caught stealing 3rd on a wild pitch for the second out. He looked safe in the review, but it wasn’t overturned.

In the 8th, Ramos lollygagged toward a catchable foul ball off the bat of Grichuk, which proved to be consequential as Grichuk drove the next ball deep into the seats.

TL;DR - How’d the Baby Jays do?

Gurriel Jr: 0-for-3 with a walk and two strikeouts, left four on base

Jansen: 0-for-4

McKinney: 2-for-3 with two doubles and a walk, missed another homer by a foot

Shafer: Pitched three scoreless innings, two of them clean

Jays of the Day: Shafer doesn’t have the number (+.088), but he was great. The rest of the bullpen minus Clippard should get one too. Morales should probably get a super Jay of the Day for his record breaking homer. What a turnaround from him.

Suckage: Estrada (-.313), Clippard didn’t have the number but he deserved one, and let’s give one to Teoscar too (0-for-4 with a golden sombrero. He is going to have to earn back his playing time in September)

We had 458 comments in the GameThread...great for a Sunday and a game that was over pretty early. DangYouToHeck led us to victory.

The Blue Jays head out on the road to Baltimore where they will be blessed enough to play another series against the Orioles. Sam Gaviglio will start tomorrow night for the Jays, and the O’s starter isn’t official on mlb.com yet, but Buck said it should be David Hess.