Blue Jays 1 Rangers 7
There is an ancient Chinese proverb about how it is hard to win a game if you only score one run.
The unfortunate thing is that they beat the horse (by horse, I mean pitching staff) hard in August to get us back in the race. There is only so long you can beat a horse until it is dead. It amazes me when people try to complain about Schneider, saying he should have pulled a pitcher earlier. Does anyone really think we should be using more relievers?
Anyway, Dylan Cease didn’t have
‘it’. He’s been ridden hard. Too hard obviously. He gave up four runs in the second inning and that was about it for the game. Cease only made it through 2.2 innings, giving up six walks. Only one of four runs against was earned (there was an Ernie Clement throwing error in there, speaking of players ridden hard), but he had a really rough time. Not that any manager wouldn’t have ridden him hard considering lack of innings we’ve gotten out of other ‘starters’.
We used five relievers. I enjoyed watching Brendan Cellucci (who got four outs without allowing a run) and Jose Rodriguez (who got five outs, giving up just a hit, with two strikeouts). Brayden Fisher, Brendon Little (we really didn’t have much imagination when naming kids around the turn of the century), and Joe Mantiply each gave up a run, though Little’s wasn’t earned as the run scored because of a Kazuma Okamoto error.
Offensively, we didn’t do much. Five hits. Two by Straw (who had the lone RBI), and one each from Vlad, Kirk, and Okamoto. Even Brett Bateman went hitless.
As one of the talking heads said ‘when a team isn’t hitting it looks listless’.
Jay of the Day: Straw (0.10 WPA).
Other Award: Cease (-0.28), Bateman (-0.12, I want to go back and check see if that is his first ‘other award’, but, at the moment, I’m tired of baseball), and Clement (-0.10).
Tomorrow we have José Soriano (12-7, 3.56) vs Cal Quantrill (9-5, 2.90). It is a 7:00 Eastern start. Jose, we are really going to need some innings out of you.
