Weird Finish, But Jays Beat Red Sox

Blue Jays 5 Red Sox 4

Well, it shouldn’t have been that close.

I gotta say that Reese McGuire had his best moment for the Blue Jays in the ninth. Why was he running? If it was a homer, off the wall, he could have walked home. But no, he gives us the last out of the game.

A good start for Jose Berrios if you ignore the 3 runs fourth inning.

In the fourth, he gave up singles to Masataka Yoshida and Justin Turner. Then a Rafael Devers home run tied the game. Joe Siddal talked about the four slurves below the zone. I don’t know, the one Devers hit was about 3 inches off the ground, and I have a hard time believing that Rafael was expecting a fourth one. But he went down and got it. Because it didn’t work, it was the wrong call.

After that, Jose got three quick outs. In total, he went 5.2 innings, allowed 6 hits, 3 earned, no walks, with 6 strikeouts. He came out of the game with two outs in the sixth, after a hit batter and a double, bringing the tying run to third.

Genesis Cabrera came in with lefty Triston Casas due up. The Red Sox pinch-hit our old friend Rob Refsnyder in his spot. I was happy Casas was out of the game. Cabrera struck out Refsnyder.

Yimi Garcia pitched a quick seventh. Tim Mayza gave up a one-out single in the eighth but then got a strikeout. And got the first out of the ninth.

Erik Swanson came in for the two-out save. Adam Duvall ground one to the hole at short, DeJong did a great job to get to it, but his throw was just late. Then the Jays had Reese McGuire pinch hit, he singled to right to put the tying run on. Luis Urias singled. Tying run at second.

But Conner Wong hit a fly ball to the track in left. McGuire decided it was a home run, took off from second. When Kiermaier caught it, he was doubled off easy.

I saw him running from second on the fly, and I wondered what I was missing. I guess I wasn’t missing anything.

We scored:

• Three in the third: Brandon Belt hit a one-out homer. Then, an out later, Springer singled, went to second on Devers’ throwing error, and stole third. Alejandro Kirk doubled off the wall in left. Chapman singled Kirk to third. And Varsho singled Kirk home. After that, Davis Schneider walked, but Paul DeJong ground out.
• One in the sixth: With one out, Schneider singled. Then DeJong singled, and Merrifield walked to load the bases. Brandon Belt singled home one. We should have got more, but Vlad hit into a double play.
• One in the ninth: Springer singled. Kirk walked. Chapman ground out, moving up the runners. With a lefty pitching, John pinch-hit Santiago Espinal for Varsho. I didn’t like the move (they brought in Kevin Kiermaier in the eighth to improve defense, then you pulled Varsho to make the defense worse. But ok. Surprisingly, the Red Sox gave Espinal an intentional walk. Kevin Kiermaier, against a lefty, sliced off a single to left, giving us a much-needed run. Then DeJong lined one to medium right. Kirk bluffed going but was stopped (he wouldn’t have scored), but Espinal thought Kirk was running and took off for third and was the third out.

Espinal isn’t playing well enough to do something dumb like that on the bases, you have to watch the guy ahead of you.

Thankfully, McGuire made his base running mistake too.

We had 14 hits, so we should have scored more.

Springer had 4, Schneider 3 and Belt 2. Merrifield and Guerrero had 0 fors.

Vlad had a particularly bad night. He came up twice with loaded bases and didn’t bring in a run. After yesterday’s home run and double, I was hoping for better.

Jays of the Day: Belt (.254 WPA), Mayza (.199), Springer (.162), Garcia (.112), Garcia (.106) and Schneider (.102, 2 MLB games, 2 JoDs).

But we need to give McGuire a special award, though apparently, the third base coach signalled a home run. That might have fooled Reese.

The Other Award: Vlad (-.267).

Tomorrow we try for the sweep. Bassitt starts for the Jays. TBD for the Red Sox, another opener.