Literally everything exciting in last night’s game happened in the eleventh inning. It was one of those tied affairs that you just had to wait out and see what happens. And it’s tense because the tie could swing either way. There was a time when you were confident that the tie would swing our way because our offense and bullpen were both solid beyond question. Currently, our offense and bullpen are solid, but being that an entire third of our starting lineup is out for the season, I’d say we have a good amount to worry about.
For the most part, Dice-K was stellar. He tossed a full eight innings which was an extremely welcome break from Lester’s sad excuse of a performance. He gave up four runs on nine hits while walking three and striking out eight. He threw 109 pitches. His fastball, slider, curveball, and cutter were all working with some nice movement. His changeup still needs work but he only threw about four of them so it didn’t feature prominently. He gets points for going deep, lasting past five in his last thirteen starts, and only giving up four runs. But he loses points for earning a no-decision instead of a win because he gave up our lead, partially through giving up a two-run home run to Overbay.
In the third, McDonald walked, Scutaro doubled, and Drew was hit to load the bases, and V-Mart singled in two runs. In the fifth, V-Mart turned a full-count fastball into another RBI single. Beltre’s bloop single added another run.
In the fourth, we thank V-Mart for limiting the damage to one Jays run and not two by holding onto the ball at the plate through the collision with Overbay.
We were up by three before yet another return of the one bad inning. It was the sixth this time. Dice-K gave up three runs on nineteen pitches, which is pretty economical considering his past pitch counts during his bad innings. And it was a real shame; he mowed right through the Jays before and after that but for some reason had to fail at locating that pitch.
We could have sent everybody home in the eighth. Escobar dropped Lowell’s routine popup, which ended up in the stands, so Lowell reached second with nobody out. But Hall and McDonald struck out and Scutaro grounded out.
Fortunately, all the relievers who cleaned up Lester’s mess got the day off last night because we used only Bard and Paps, who both pitched well and held down the fort. But Bard had to toss two full frames, so he’ll probably be unavailable today.
And now we come to the theatrics of the eleventh inning: a walkoff home run from one of the most unlikely sources in our lineup. In the top of the inning, Lowrie made a very strange fielding error. He stood under a popup waiting to catch it and just didn’t catch it. There was no wind; I think he was just slightly out of position. So it proved, thankfully, to be consequential, but it was just bizarre. But he made up for it; he used all the power and extension he had to send a hanging curveball over the fence in right! It’s his first career walkoff homer and third homer of the season. Clearly those hours in the weight room have paid off. He is currently in the middle of a career-high nine-game hitting streak during which he’s batting .357 with three doubles, seven homers and runs, and five RBIs.
V-Mart improved his already strong average against Romero by going three for five. Scutaro also went three for five for his third consecutive multi-hit game and is currently in the middle of an eight-game hitting streak during which he’s batting .406 with four doubles, six runs, and three RBIs. Drew went two for three.
And so it was good. It turned out alright. The bullpen got a rest, we got the win, we had three multi-hit games in the lineup, and we can be happy about that. We need every hit, every run, and every win that we can scrape together. So there’s nothing to do now but do it again.
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