Game 130 – Heartbreaker

What a heartbreaking loss. With a win the Jays would have moved to within 6 of the Sox w/32 to play. It would still take a big Sept. but sure would look better than 8 back. Burnett was not up to the challenge today surrendering 4 in the 3rd to blow a 2-0 lead, then giving up a solo shot in the 7th to tie things up at 5.

Burnett gave up 4 hits and walked 2 in the 4-run 3rd. The other 6 innings he gave up 3 hits and walked one. The real killer was walking the 8 and 9 hitters. After retiring Varitek, Burnett walked both Cora and Crisp on full count pitches. He then got Ellsbury to line out before Pedroia took him deep on the 1st pitch, but it never should have got that far.

When it got to the bullpens I thought the Jays had control and Downs and Ryan did their part w/2 and 1 inning respectively. However League picked a bad time to end his scoreless streak (it was 14 2/3 innings) and the Jays could not take advantage of a leadoff BB from Delcarmen in the bottom half.

I thought it was a good move by Cito leaving Downs in for a 2nd inning. He could have went w/Ryan at that point since there would no longer be a save situation, but if you can get 2 innings out of Downs then you just keep Ryan for the 10th and that pushes all your other relievers back an inning in the pecking order.

It was a good send by Leyva in the 6th trying to get Stairs to score. It is too bad HP ump, Campos, blew the call at the plate as it was one of those the ball beat the runner so you’re out calls regardless of whether the slide beat the tag. The Jays had 2 out and McDonald coming up so you had to take that chance no matter how tired Stairs looked coming around 3rd. Plus it required pretty much a perfect relay from the Sox to get him.

Surprisingly enough it wasn’t the walks that got Matsuzaka in trouble. Matsuzaka only walked one batter and it was an intentional walk. Instead, it was the hits that got him as he gave up 8 hits including 2 HR’s and ended up leaving after giving up 5 runs in 6 innings. Matsuzaka’s #’s this yr are so misleading if you just look at W-L record and ERA.

I thought a smart play that Inglett could have tried was to drop the ball on the Ellsbury line drive in the 3rd. It was a soft line drive and Ellsbury wasn’t running it out very hard. Inglett would have had time to pick the ball up and either throw to 2nd and onto 1st to get a conventional DP or he could have thrown to 1st to get the force out and then they would have had Crisp stuck between 1st and 2nd assuming Crisp would have broke for 2nd once he saw the ball drop. Of course the umpire may have decided to rule it an infield fly. Even if that were the case you may confuse the runners and still be able to get one of them out. When an infield fly is called the runners are allowed to attempt to advance should the ball drop, but they do so at their own risk.

The difference in this game could very well be the teams hitting w/RISP. The Jays went 1 for 6 whereas the Sox went 2 for 4.

Now for the stats:
Adv: Lind (4)
P-Adv: Matsuzaka
NAdv: Stairs (9)
P-NAdv: Matsuzaka
WG: Bay