Jose Bautista returned to the lineup Friday night to face the New York Yankees. The Jays were looking to get their second win in a row and hopefully go on a little bit of a streak. The pitchers were Brendan Morrow, who was looking for his first win of the season and Andy Pettitte, who has had a great start to the season. The Yankees who are considered “too old” had a few familiar faces on their team; Lyle Overbay and Vernon Wells who are both ex-Jays. The Yankees going into this series have won every time they scored first and this time was no different. They scored two runs in the first inning, which was not the best start for the Jays. They came back with one run but in the third and sixth inning the Yankees scored three runs in each and one more in the seventh and that is all they needed to win 9-4. Morrow was anything but special that night, having 9 hits, 7 runs, and 5 earned runs against him in 5.1 innings with only 4 strikeouts. To make matters more depressing, Wells and Overbay each hit a homerun against their former team. The good news on the Jays side was Lawrie got two hits, Bautista hit a homerun and Arencibia hit his sixth homerun of the season. The Jays were not terrible at the plate and hopefully they can keep up the hitting against the Yankees in the next two games and for the rest of the season.
The second game started off the same for the Jays; the Yankees were up 3-0 until the bottom of the 8th inning when the Jays scored three runs to tie the game, thanks to Rajai Davis and Melky Cabrera, who drove in the RBI’s to tie the game. The game needed extra innings and in the 11th inning with two men on for the Yankees Ichiro Suzuki hit a bunt to Blue Jays pitcher Aaron Loup who then threw the ball to third and that went past Bret Lawrie who was not even ready for the play anyway. The Yankees would score two runs off the error. The Jays would not score in the bottom of the inning and the rest was history, the Yankees win 5-3.
The starting pitchers were Mark Buehrle and Hiroki Kuroda, Kuroda went seven and a third with only 3 hits, 1 run and 7 strikeouts, while Buehrle who had a harder day had 8 hits off of him, 3 runs against and 7 strikeouts as well. Both pitchers earned a no decision, but it was nice to see the new Jay pitchers, they are starting to warm up, all they need is runs to be scored earlier more often. Sunday will be the game where the Jays can salvage something and hopefully no one will get swept by the Yankees.
Going into the third and final game of the series, the Jays had a very unfortunate stat; they had only scored multiple runs in only three innings this season. The Jays came in the game trying their best to avoid the sweep by the Yankees. It is bad enough they have lost more than they have won, but a sweep would be going in the wrong direction. Josh Johnson could have used a few more calls in his favor from the umpire than he did – he went five and a third with 8 hits and four runs scored against him. Luckily those were the only runs the Jays allowed.
The Jays were down 4-2 in the bottom of the sixth, but they finally woke up and in the 6th and scored four runs, and in the 7th they scored two more and that was all they needed as the Blue Jays won 8-4 over the Yankees. The Yankees pitching struggled this game and every pitcher at least had one run scored against.
The Blue Jays face the Orioles for three games in Baltimore and then face the Yankees again in a four game series. Hang onto your hats, the Jays need to get lucky and earn 4 or more wins in the next 7 days because it is all division teams and to lose this week might affect them down the road. I am still optimistic that the Jays will wake up and really start to dominate the AL East.
Nick’s Notes
Those Pesky Ex-Jays: Vernon Wells and Lyle Overbay returned to Toronto in the uniforms of the hated New York Yankees and both got taunted like Alex Rios did earlier in the week. Overbay would get 3-10 with two RBI’s and a run, but he did have a homerun. Wells, however, was a factor in these games 7-15 with 4 runs, 3 RBI’s and two homeruns. Hopefully they will not play this well in New York when the Jays meet them.
It was Edwin Encarnacion bobble head day at the Rogers Center with the first 20,000 fans getting the bobble head. The attendance was over 45,000 people, which is great. The club also averaged over 40,000 during the whole series, which is even better for the Jays. Now aside the fact that maybe the Jays should win more in front of the large crowds, I feel that the bobble head night should have been given out in a game where a large crowd was not expected. The Jays always draw large crowds in when Boston and New York show, so why have a give-away when they are around? I know it is up to the Jays and they can do whatever they want but I think the give-away should be given when a team like the Royals come to town, when they only draw 15,000 people, but again that is just me.
Melky Cabrera, who is a former Yankee, went 6-13, 1 run and 4 RBI’s against his former team. Adam had a funny series, he appeared in two of the three games and had scored 2 runs and went 0-0, he had 5 walks against the Yankees. JP Arencibia hit his 7th home run of the month, that ties him with former Blue Jay John Buck for firs in homeruns hit by a catcher.
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