A Good Old Fashioned Cock-Up

An accidental photo from spring training

In my blog absence a lot has happened. The Blue Jays swept the Royals. They turned a triple play. Colby Rasmus hit two home runs. Bautista hit a homerun. Aren't we all ready, for the home run king to return to the plate? I sure am.

But I want to take it back. To the last series at home against the Rays (April 17, 18, 19), most specifically that painful game on the 18th. Yes that one. You know the one. We've all tried to forget it in the euphoria of sweeping the Royals. But here's the reality folks. The Jays and the Royals play two series. The Jays and the Rays play six.

Buster Olney over at ESPN has recently written a little expose that could have been done by anybody with a calculator. And something we all knew to begin with. The scheduling is unfair. Teams in the AL East have to play the best teams, the most often. And sadly, the Jays are not quite at the point that they are considered the best.

So back to the fateful night. I have recently decided that this is the summer I get my friends to love baseball. One friend at time. So that night, I convinced my best friend to come down to the dome and sit in the 500s with me. I was already sleeping on her couch, so it was an easy sell.
It started off well! We went for batting practice and got schooled by an usher how to bat our eyelashes to Rays trainers in order to get balls. It worked. It worked so well that we got a ball and in the little eight year old beside me DIDNT. Sometimes its fun being a girl.

I saw my former favorite Blue Jay, Jose Molina. (Yes, seriously. Don't laugh) I even got a wave and a big cuddly bear smile. I miss that man. And his strike calling. But I digress.

We hiked up the ramp, took our seats. And my friend started asking questions. Awesome. I answered them in a fun and quirky way, in order to best help her develop some baseball love.
Then came that question,
"Man, why are they always touching themselves?"
"Look at the Jay at third base. He's obsessed! He's going to give himself a rash."

You can probably guess what happened next. I was such a girl that day. I feel sorry for the guy sitting in our row with us. Yup, you guessed it. We watched Lawrie touch his crotch for an hour, which is pretty much the same thing as watching the game.

Let's talk about that ninth inning. I really like Carlos Villeuneva. I really do. I saw him jogging out of that left field bull pen, and I said to my friend, "He's good. He'll shut them down. Jays might be able to score a couple of runs in the bottom of the inning." Maybe not enough to win it, but enough to make it respectable.

But he didn't shut them down. And John Farrell didn't seem to care. A HBP, an error, a force out, a wild pitch, a walk. It was time to take him out. Instead they watch him issue an rbi walk. Watch him allow a bases loaded single. Somewhere between the single and the grand slam they roused young Crawford to get warm, but really what's the point? The damage was done.

I don't know what was going on down there player-wise, management-wise. But this is what it looked like to me from the 500s: Management gave up. They watched Carlos Villeneuva get hung out to dry, because they knew they were going to lose and didn't feel like using another pitcher. The game wasn't over. A good team dosen't give up, and I think the Jays could be a good team, which is what pissed me off. This is baseball. Anything could have happened, the Jays could have scored four runs in the bottom of the ninth. But they didn't get the opportunity, because when a player walks up to the plate in the bottom of the ninth, you can bet your ass they don't play their best when they are down by ten runs. 

The Blue Jays play in the AL East. They have to play the best teams all the time. I love this team. And I will support them regardless, but the entire team, players, coaches, manager need to go out every day and play their best. They can't give up, they won't win if they give up.