Monday Bantering

Yesterday was a fun day for the Jays. They stomped the Phillies 9-0 in a non-televised game. Travis Shaw went deep for the second time in two days, and also managed a walk with one strikeout. His spring OPS is now up to .815, so hopefully this is him hitting his stride.

Bo Bichette also went yard for the second time this spring, also off Velazquez:

Alejandro Kirk homered off Bud Norris, his first of the spring:

Every starter except Brandon Drury got on base (although Reese McGuire needed a wild pitch on a swinging strikeout to do it).

On the mound, Matt Shoemaker went 4.0 innings, striking out four and allowing no hits and only one walk. Ty Tice walked three, but avoided any damage by inducing a double play and a groundout. The rest of the relief crew cruised, with Tom Pannone, AJ Cole, Jordan Romano, and Bryan Baker each tossing a quick shutout inning.

Not much in the way of Jays news. It sounds like Teoscar’s groin injury, reported on Friday, isn’t serious:

He’s DHing today.

For anyone who subscribes to The Athletic, Kaitlyn McGrath has a profile on Matt Shoemaker’s fearless approach to pitching that’s pretty interesting. The man seems to have a knack for ending up in freak accidents.

Over at SportsNet, Arden Zwelling has a piece where Ryan Borucki, Andy Burns, and Patrick Cantwell share some minor league road trip horror stories. It makes me thankful for my desk job.

Today’s Lineups

It’s split squad action for the Jays today. At 1:05pm ET, Anthony Kay and the B squad face off against Trevor Williams and the Pirates down in Bradenton, while at 1:07, Hyun-Jin Ryu and most of the starters host Blake Snell the Rays back in Dunedin. Naturally the pirates game is the one on TV, while the home game will be radio only.

The game everyone wants to see:

The game that wouldn’t be of interest:

Snark aside, I’ll be interested to see how Kay looks. I always come away pretty impressed when I watch him pitch.