After no walk off games all year the Jays are involved in back-to-back ones. Unfortunately on the wrong end of both and they came w/2 outs on singles to Vernon Wells scoring a runner from 2nd. What a series of events for Vernon in the past 2 games. 1st he gets robbed by Pedroia of the go-ahead RBI on Tue, then he bobbles the ball failing to throw out Ortiz, he gets a 2nd chance on Wed and throws out Lowrie, but this one comes w/1 out so what do you know he gets another hit to him but this time cannot throw out Ramirez. A throw on the money from Vernon does not beat Manny to the plate but it allows Barajas to attempt to block the plate which may have been enough to get him.
On Tue. it was Pedroia robbing Wells in the 9th, on Wed it was Moss robbing Rios in the 8th. The Jays cannot even get a bounce to go there way. I realize Scutaro was thinking of scoring on the Rios fly ball, but w/nobody out he has to be close enough to the bag where he can tag and move to 3rd, even if it means he only gets to 3rd should the ball drop in b/c if that’s the case you still have 1st and 3rd none out. If Scutaro is at 3rd w/1 out that changes the AB’s of Eckstein and Rolen.
Although it is a small sample, the Jays added an 0 for 4 to their RISP #’s. They are bound to start getting some hits, there is just no way this continues.
I thought for a while that Lind couldn’t buy a hit as he got robbed again his 1st time up by Pedroia but he finally got one through in the 8th. He is due to get a few bloop hits now.
Whether or not Papelbon balked on the pickoff, I couldn’t tell but I don’t think McDonald was out anyway. Even after seeing the replay once I got back to my hotel I still think he was safe. Youkilis tagged him above the elbow and I think the hand was already on the bag. Even the Overbay slow roller in the 9th to end the inning it looked like Overbay beat it out. And once again it was Ortiz getting the favourable ball call on the 1-0 pitch in the 7th. All this just adds to my theory of the umpire bias at Fenway.
Matsuzaka pitched well but I believe he is very beatable. He is not very efficient w/his pitches and he really seems like a different pitcher w/runners on base. It looks like he is really fighting his command when working from the stretch.
Interesting to see Delcarmen come into face one hitter, a LH but I have to assume Francona liked Delcarmen vs. Lind more than Okajima vs. Stewart. I think once Lind is hitting, he wouldn’t take that matchup but b/c Lind was slumping he went with it, even though Stewart isn’t exactly on a roll either.
I agreed w/pulling McGowan when Gibbons did, but I start the 9th w/Carlson to face Ortiz, then use Frasor for Ramirez, Lowell and if necessary go to Downs for Moss and the 2 switch hitters, Varitek and Crisp. If they insist on carrying 7 relievers, then why not use them and play the matchups. There is no reason to have a lefty facing Ramirez in the 9th unless 1st base is open and you are intentionally walking him. Of course that would require Gibbons to actually use Frasor in an important role something he continually refuses to do.
On to the game stats: For the same reason Inge did not get an advance when his SF also moved the runner from 2nd to 3rd, Rios does not get a non-advance when his SF did not move Scutaro to 3rd. Remember, I’m only counting AB’s.
NAdv: Lowell
P-NAdv: Downs (2)
WG: Rolen (1), Pedroia, Moss
ME(r): Scutaro (2)
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