Saturday Bantering: Urena down, Buchholz added

I should have guessed that it would be Richard Urena losing his MLB spot for Clay Buchholz, but I was hoping they would come up with a better plan. After using four relievers yesterday, it wasn’t going to be a pitcher heading out, and they aren’t quite ready to expose Alen Hanson to waivers, though it will likely happen at some point this year.

Urena was one of the few Blue Jays actually hitting, with a .333/.360/.458 line in 24 at bats. When I was young a .333 batting average didn’t get you a ticket back to the minors. The good old days.

Sunscreen Boy gets today’s start after giving up 4 home runs in 5 innings in his start in Buffalo. It does seem like the start of an Abbot and Costello skit. “let me understand this, you are demoting the guy hitting .333 and promoting the guy who gave up 4 home runs in his start? Can we go back to trying to Who is on first?”

I get that we want to be aggressive on the bases, but we had 2 guys thrown trying to pick up an extra base:

• In the 5th inning, with us down 5-0 and Randal Grichuk on first, Urena gets out first hit of the game and then gets thrown out trying to stretch it to a double. It took a replay challenge to call him out, but down 5 we shouldn’t be having this happen. Don’t go for a base unless you are sure.
• In the 7th inning Freddy Galvis gets thrown out at third, on a pitch that was in the dirt. We scored 6 runs that inning and had the tying run at the plate and that’s how the inning ended. Yeah, they likely should have challenged it. I don’t think it is likely that the call would have been changed, but that was a big moment in the game. Take a shot.

These things really shouldn’t happen. Being aggressive is fine, but maybe take into account the game situation?

Galvis was irritated by the home plate umpire and not because of the inconsistent strike zone, but because the umpire and the catcher were chatting during his at bat. From John Lott’s story in the Athletic:

“You’re hitting, and you hear those guys talking and talking and talking,” he said. “I feel like you have to have some respect for the game. Everybody’s trying to focus; we’re in front of a lot of people, and this is pro baseball. I went back to the video room to look at the pitches, and they were balls. I wasn’t mad because they were balls; I know, as a human being, sometimes you’re going to make mistakes. That’s not my problem. My problem is if you don’t act professional.”

It does seem like something that shouldn’t be happening. The batter has to focus on the pitch, I don’t think it is too much to ask that conversations stop during that time.

The Giants and Rockies played 18 innings last night. Giants won it. 19 pitchers were used by the two teams, including a few old friends: Seunghwan Oh for the Rockies and Sam Dyson and Travis Bergen for the Giants. Bergen pitched the final 2 innings, getting 5 strikeouts and got the win. Kevin Pillar was 1 for 7. He is hitting .189 for the Giants but has 3 home runs.

Vlad gets the day off in Buffalo. Bichette leads off. Vlad is to play the next four games in a row. After that? He could get called up anytime.

Today’s lineup. Yes that’s Hanson in RF. No I don’t know why.