Today in Jays History: Josh Donaldson had a Day

Eight Years Ago Today

Josh Donaldson had a day. He went 4 for 4, with 2 home runs, a double, a walk, 5 runs and 4 RBI.

The game itself was pretty wild. The Jays blew four different leads and came away with the win.

From Kevin Papetti’s recap:

Horrendous defence, poor bullpen management, and a rough performance from Liam Hendriks nearly kept Toronto from winning a third straight game. The Blue Jays gave up the lead in the second, fifth, sixth, and eighth. Errors were committed, mental mistakes were made, and countless double plays were not turned. The usually dominant David Robertson took the mound in the ninth with a two-run lead.

When the game seemed to be all but lost, Josh Thole started off the ninth with a single. Jose Reyes quickly followed with a double, putting two runners in scoring position for Josh Donaldson. The “Bringer of Rain” crushed a walk-off opposite-field home run to win the Blue Jays the game. Donaldson ended up 4 for 4, with 2 home runs and 5 runs. Jose Bautista played a big role as well, going 3 for 4 with 5 runs batted in.

That’s the kind of game it was, Jose Bautista was 3 for 4, with 3 doubles and 5 RBIs, and he was a footnote.

Our pitching wasn’t great:

R.A. Dickey: 5 IP, 8 H, 5 ER, 5 K, 2 BB. Much better than his line suggests, but did struggle towards the end of his outing.

Ryan Tepera: 0 IP, 1 H, 1 HBP.

Aaron Loup: 1 IP, 0 H, 1K. Induced two possible double play balls, before striking out Jose Abreu.

Roberto Osuna: 1 IP, 0H. Pitched around a Jose Reyes error.

Liam Hendriks: 0.2 IP, 5 H, 3 ER, 1K.

Steve Delabar: 1.1 IP, 0 H, 1K.

There were errors. Kevin Pillar and Jose Reyes each made errors, and bad plays from Chris Colabello and Steve Tolleson cost Dickey.

Also, from the recap:

Jays of the Day go to Josh Donaldson (.758), Jose Bautista (.702), Josh Thole (.222), and Jose Reyes (.109). I will also give one to Aaron Loup (0.61) who induced two potential double play balls, before striking out Jose Abreu.

Five Years Ago

Minor Leaguer led a campaign to get Luke Maile voted into the All-Star game.

“I have been criss-crossing through the towns and cities of Ontario this spring, going into the homes of real, hardworking families,” BJNBBBBCBBC’s co-founder Minor Leaguer said from a local holding cell where he is fighting charges of breaking and entering. “And they all ask me whether Luke Maile is legit—right after ‘who are you and what are you doing in my house?’”

“So when I gave Blue Jays Nation’s Cam Lewis a call, I asked him for bail money and for him to work with us to form a campaign organization to get Lukey Barrels into the All-Star Game.”

It was unsuccessful.

Thirteen Years Ago

I came to the finish line of a bit of irritation with the Blue Jays.

The back story?

I had gotten tickets, a flight, and a hotel to visit Toronto to watch two Jays’ home series. The G20 Summit was to be held in Toronto then, but I had people I talked to in the front office who insisted the games would not be moved.

Then, one morning, Paul Beeston was on TV saying they were moving the games to Philadelphia. If you remember what happened, you’ll know it was a good decision. In a news conference, Beeston said how the Jays would work with Phillies fans who planned to come to the city for the series to ensure they got everything refunded. Nothing was said about Canadians who planned to go.

I phoned and emailed people in the Jays’ front office, but no one replied.

I wrote a couple of irritated posts. I wasn’t feeling the love from the team.

Finally, I emailed Paul Beeston, and that got me some action:

Monday I decided to take a last stab at it. I had emailed any Jay front office person that had ever replied to a note from me before (including Alex Anthpoulos) and haven’t had any luck. Why not try the top dog. “Dear Mr. Beeston’. I ought to take a look back at the note, but I’m pretty sure I vented a little. Ok maybe vented a lot. “

I guess, in retrospect, I should have started with him. Sending an email to him almost guarantees that at least his secretary will read it. If that happens there is a shot she will forward it to someone that might care. Or whose job it would become to care.

Yesterday I came home to a voice mail message from John Santana from the Blue Jays. Just an aside, but wouldn’t it be cool to have a job where you can phone people and say ‘Hi, I’m John from the Blue Jays’. Anyway he said to call back and I did this morning.

He couldn’t have been nicer. We were on the phone for about 2 minutes when the fire alarm went off where his office is at Rogers Center. He tried to continue to talk but a) the alarm was loud and b) I was glad that he took the time to call but it wasn’t worth him dying in a fire. So he said he’d call back in ten and he did. I’m relatively sure the stadium didn’t burn to the ground.

He was very apologetic about me not getting a reply to earlier emails. To, finally, get to the point, at the end of a long process, I now have tickets to the three games in Philly. Have to rent a car to drive out there, but it should be fun, I’ve gone north and east of Toronto in various holidays but never south. I’ve not been to Philadelphia or Niagara Falls, or any of the other places I’ll get to drive through.

As well as him helping me buy tickets for the game in Philly he offered to upgrade our tickets for the Cardinal series, which was very nice of him. So we are going to have tickets somewhere in behind the plate there. All-in-all I’m starting to look forward to the trip again. I’m giving up on the idea that we could get an interview or two while I’m there, I’m just going to enjoy the baseball.

It was a fun trip, other than the Jays could have done better against the Phillies. I saw Roy Halladay best the Jays, which was rather sad. And drove from Philadelphia to Washington to visit with Hugo, Mrs. Hugo, and their kids (one just a couple of months old, almost a teenager now).

My favourite story: We had been in a hurry and had been eating in fast food places and drive-throughs, so we wanted one nice meal. So I asked Hugo where to go for a good dinner in Philly. He said Al’s Steaks. So, we dressed decently, looking forward to a nice sit-down meal. Hugo had left out the word cheese. It was a cheesesteak place. We stood in line for 30 minutes for basically Subway. It turned out well. The road this place was on had a lot of people walking up and down and a ton of drama going out. Women yelling at men, men yelling at women. So we got dinner and a show.

I didn’t see much of Philidelphia. Our hotel was right near the ballpark. We drove from Toronto the day of the game and arrived just in time for the second inning. Then we visited Hugo before game two and returned in time for that game. And we left right after game three. So now, if I travel for baseball, I build in time to sightsee.