Game 26 – 11 Man Staff

More of the same from the Jays hitting wise as they go just 1 for 7 w/RISP. However this game they actually got some extra base hits and managed to put up enough runs to win, thankfully ending the losing streak at 6.

I’ve been on Pevey a couple times now for sends/no sends but very heads up on his part sending Rios once he saw Guillen throw it into 2nd. Not sure if Guillen was worried about Rolen trying for 2nd or just assumed Rios wouldn’t be able to score.

I was surprised to see Meche left in to face Rios in the 7th. Meche was up to 118 pitches and more importantly Rios was already 3 for 3 against him. However, it worked out as this time Meche got Rios to fly out.

Loved to see Gibbons use the hit and run w/Wells. He was in an 0 for 15 slump so why not force him to swing and just try to make contact rather than him trying to do too much. It is too bad the Jays could not capitalize on the 1st and 3rd none out though. I don’t like the straight steal by Wells after though. I realize the offence is struggling but I’d rather give them 2 chances to hit a fly ball and get the SF or 3 chances to get the hit to score at least 1.

Much better start from Litsch as he finally made it through 7 innings. If he can more often than not even give them 6 innings than maybe the Jays will finally do the right thing and go to an 11 man pitching staff. The Jays certainly have the other 4 starters who are capable of giving them innings and even w/the 20 straight days w/games the bullpen isn’t really overworked. Of course they really need to keep 3 RH’s so that basically means either Tallet or Carlson has to go, but neither of them deserves to be sent down. The next option is trade but for what. A reliever himself isn’t going to get a starting position player and I like the makeup of the Jays bench especially if they add the extra guy and I think Coats fits the bill of what they need but that doesn’t mean they couldn’t do better than him via a trade. So unless they package a couple relievers or put one w/someone else the only other option is trade for younger players.

I was a little confused and worried when Gibbons brought in Ryan to pitch the 8th. I thought he might try to have him pitch 2 innings. I’m glad to see he didn’t use him in the 9th, so that means the reason he must have used him in the 8th was in case the Royals took the lead against a different reliever than there would be no 9th for Ryan to pitch. And with the day off on Mon. clearly they wanted to make sure Ryan got some game action in now. I think we may see more of this until everyone feels Ryan is fully recovered. They need to make sure he never sits too long w/o throwing even if that means using him in different situations.

I was surprised to see Carlson the one coming out for the 9th. However a lefty made sense w/the LH’s due up for KC but I expected Downs. This is one of those aspects though that you often don’t know as a fan, that Downs was actually a little sore and unavailable. With the save I think Carlson is definitely quickly making his way into Gibby’s good graces similar to what Wolfe did last yr.

And now for the stats:
ME(f): Guillen, Pena Jr., Gload