Game 150 – Bad Calls in Beantown

Well the Jays struggles against lefties showed up again today. They managed only 4 hits and 1 run off Lester through 8. The lone run coming on the 2nd batter of the game when Jose Bautista hit a HR over the green monster. Lester threw just 7 first pitch balls to the 30 hitters he faced. 2 of the 7 got hits (incl. the HR by Bautista) and 1 walked.

The Blue Jays did however come to life in the 9th off Papelbon. Papelbon had thrown 8 scoreless innings against the Jays this season coming into this game. The Jays got 3 straight hits to start the inning and if not for a blown call the Jays would have had the tying run on 2nd. Overbay hit a fly ball off the monster in left and tried for 2nd but was thrown out. I couldn’t really tell one way or the other whether he was safe or not but later when I saw the replay it showed he was safe. Papelbon then retired the next 2 on groundballs to end the game.

That call was not the only one to go against the Jays. Zaun hit a slow roller to 2nd and I thought he beat the throw. The ump, Dana DeMuth, did not agree. I wasn’t able to see the replay on this one so no 2nd look. The Zaun call may not have played a big role in this game (then again you never know), but the Overbay one certainly did. It completely changed that 9th inning taking the Jays tying run off the basepaths. Instead of having the tying run at 2nd and none out, they had the tying run up to bat and 1 out.

For the 3rd consecutive game the Jays were using a starter on 3 days rest. This time it was Halladay and he pitched ok. He gave up 6 hits and 3 runs (2 earned) in 7 innings. He walked none while striking out 5. Coco Crisp twice came up w/2-out RBI hits and neither was hit that hard. The first was a groundball through the right side and the 2nd a soft line drive into shallow LF.

B.J. Ryan came on to get some work in the 8th but he gave up what turned out to be a huge insurance run. It wasn’t exactly his fault though as Ortiz hit a sinking line drive to right that Rios came in on and went for the catch instead of laying back and playing it on the hop. Rios missed the ball and it went all the way to the wall giving Ortiz a 3B. Youkilis then hit a SF to centre.

Here are the stats:
Adv: Varitek
P-Adv: Halladay (6)
Adv+: Lind (5)
P-Adv+: Papelbon
ME(f): Rolen (1), Rios (5)