[THE HANGOVER] The One Where We Discuss A Dramatic DP, Upton’s Ankle And The Rays As The ’96 Yankees
BJ Upton, Carl Crawford, Joaquin Benoit, Joe Maddon, Matt Garza, New Stadium, Rafael Soriano July 28th. 2010, 7:41am
The GBT – The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.
click above image for boxscore
THE GOOD: Twin Killings. With the bases loaded and only 1 out, Evan Longoria took a sharp grounder and instead of going home for the easy out, he went to second to barely get the lead runner and Reid Brignac turned under enormous pressure to get the second out at first. Might have been the most dramatic double-play we have ever see…Joaquin Benoit. We have said this before, but we can’t help but think that Benoit is to Mariano Rivera what Rafael Soriano is to John Wetteland what the 2010 Rays are to the 1996 Yankees. Go ahead, let Soriano get all the glory. Benoit will get all the big outs. And Benoit has the better chance of being back next year…Joe Maddon. With 2 outs in the 7th and the tying run on 2nd, Joe Maddon had Randy Choate intentionally walk Miguel Cabrera to put he tying run at 3rd base. JoeMa then went to Grant Balfour who got Brennan Boesch to strike out to end the inning. Sweet. Fancy. Moses!
THE BAD: The Offense: Two wins and it is easy to overlook the struggles of the offense. In 16 innings so far in this series, the Rays have 8 hits. Luckily one was a Matt Joyce grand slam and another was a Carlos Pena 2-run home run.
THE TELLING: Carl Crawford stole 3 bases and now has 399 for his career. Will ESPN break to Rays games each time CC gets on base until he steals #400?…Joe Maddon is now 388-388 as a manager, although we are not sure why that includes 29 games as the Angels interim manager and the 2 wins against the Marlins in ’06 when he was away at his wife’s graduation.
WHERE THEY STAND: The Rays are 63-36, 2 games behind the Yankees in the East and 5 games ahead of the Red Sox in the Wild Card. After 99 games in 2008, the Rays were 58-41.
THE JUNKYARD DOGS WEBTOPIA…
- BJ Upton left the game in first after spraining his ankle. He will miss 2 or 3 games. [St. Pete Times]
- Evan Longoria talks about his game-ending double-play (Video). [The Heater]
- Matt Garza’s son was not very impressed with his dad’s no-hitter. [Bright House Sports]
- Not surprisingly, the Rays say they won’t limit their search to the Gateway area of Pinellas County as was offered by St. Pete Mayor Bill Foster. [Tampa Tribune]
- Some accuse the Rays of being stubborn when it comes to trades. But when the Nationals are asking for Matt Garza in return for free-agent-to-be Adam Dunn, we wouldn’t blame Andrew Friedman if he laughed out loud. [CBS Sports]
- Joe Henderson writes that the Rays follow Joe Maddon’s fearless style. [Tampa Tribune]
- Here are a bunch of fun tidbits from Matt Garza’s no-hitter. We are still not sure why we now know that a “Max” has never thrown a no-hitter, but whatever. [ESPN]
- Jim Leyland was ejected on Monday because the umpire thought Leyland intentionally spit a sunflower seed on him. [Beck's Blog]
- 10 more great things about Matt Garza’s no-hitter. We’re a big fan of #8. [Rays Rev]
- Reflections on Matt Garza’s no-hitter. [Sports Casualties]
- Dick Vitale missed Matt Garza’s no-hittter because he is a “dummy.” [Twitter]
- Former Rays reliever Joe Nelson has been released by the Mariners. He was pitching in triple-A. [MLB Trade Rumors]
DOWN ON THE FARM…
- Check out Rays Prospects for boxscores and more detailed recaps. [Rays Prospects]
- DURHAM: (no games scheduled)
- MONTGOMERY: (no games scheduled)
- CHARLOTTE: Frank de los Santos improved to 8-6 after giving up just 1 run in 6 innings on 5 hits and a walk. He struck out 4…Tim Beckham went 2-5 with 3 strikeouts…Reid Fronk was 3-5 with a double and his 4th home run…Rocco Baldelli went 2-4 with 2 singles and an RBI.
- BOWLING GREEN: (no games scheduled)
- HUDSON VALLEY: (no games scheduled)
- PRINCETON: Eliazer Suero gave up 2 runs in 7 innings on 4 hits and 3 walks. He struck out 5. Both runs came off of home runs. His ERA is 2.17…Todd Glaesmann (2009-3) was 2-4 with a double and an RBI. He also stole his 5th base.
Related posts:
- [THE HANGOVER] The One Where We Discuss CC’s Golden Glove, Maddon’s Papi Reversal And The ’96 Yankees
- [THE HANGOVER] The One Where We Discuss Upton’s Spark, The Importance Of The Leadoff Batter And Jaso’s D
- [THE HANGOVER] The One Where We Discuss Garza’s Dominance, CC’s Contractual Motivation And Benoit’s Big Step
Much as I’d love to steal a couple from the Yankees, we’re only 61-38.
“Only” – as though we wouldn’t have killed for that no so long ago.
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Call me a lily-livered coward, but I really thought Longoria should have gone home with that throw. On the other hand, it may have been clear to him that Soriano didn’t have it last night, so he needed to go for broke.
And on the offense: when the Rays got lots of hits but left men on base we all complained. Well, now that are getting fewer hits but managing to make them count. That’s not bad offense, that’s efficiency!(I’m only half serious here — I’d like to see a few more hits, too)
Longo has balls of steel.
A co-worker brought up the point… what if Longo was concerned about Jaso making the play at home? Maybe he thought he’d take his chances with Briggy/Pena over Jaso covering home in the ultimate of situations… Not sure. Either way, the most exciting DP I’ve seen in a long, long time and chaneling shades of 2008.
Possibly he had concerns about Jaso, but don’t forget it was a force out at home, so Jaso didn’t need to apply a tag, just step on home plate. And is it altogether clear that there was no double play possibility if he’d thrown home?
Not that I wasn’t caught up in the moment like everyone else, but I’m just wondering whether he actually made the right choice.
I was wondering the same thing, seems like a 5-2-3 double play could have been more efficient with the momentum he had towards home. Either way, I’m glad it worked the way it did, made for some extra excitement!
Wow, the last 2 games have been so exciting to watch! I hope this keeps up!
At least we’ve seen Soriano be solid since his blown save last week, otherwise I might be concerned after last night’s shakiness. But he pulled it off and that’s what counts…
I was at the game last night and it was a thriller. I still cannot believe that Longo could turn that DP. Off the bat, I thought no way…
I have always thought THE great mystery in life was “Why are people willing to wait two hours to eat at Cracker Barrel?”
I now have a 2nd mystery in life…or possibly a co-#1 mystery…
WHY IS RANDY CHOATE STILL ON THIS TEAM?
funny, cause the guy in the row behind me and two seats to the right was saying the same thing as me last night. maybe you were him…
Soriano was not as bad as people say. He was unlucky the first to reach were little pops and Joyce was too worried about the wall not the ball and allowed a weak hit for a double.
Who said Soriano is bad? Name names. MFIKY will pull the voodoo on those who doubt the greatness that is our All-Star closer.
Would never call Soriano “bad” but has anyone noticed that all four of our all stars have had some unfortunate outings since the break? In Crawford’s case it was simply having his private parts in the wrong place at the wrong time. But Longoria’s been slumping; Soriano had his first really blown save (and some heart attack moments last night) and Price got creamed by the Yankees. Maybe next year we should vote to put Yankees and Red Sox players on the team.
Am I the only one hoping the Rays will use Upton’s ankle tweak as a two week audition for Jennings? We need to see where he is, and Upton’s at bats in the past week have been brutal; so many strikeouts looking and flailing.
If the Red Sox could win in 2007 by a late-season use of Ellsbury over a scuffling Crisp, why can’t the Rays be bold and think that way also?
The Matt Joyce at bats the last few days are very encouraging. He’s got bat speed.
I was thinking the same exact thing, almost called 620WAD with that question.
Has Sean Rodriguez fallen off the face of the earth? With Joyce and Brignac hitting well, he’s the odd man out. And has anyone noticed that his hitting has tailed off since he missed the game to deal with his apartment flood? Moral of the story — don’t miss a game!
yeah something is fishy about the whole Sean Rod thing…
I mean pro athletes do not do those things.. The Rays organization would have sent whoever to take care of the mess, they would rather have him there in New York.
There is something deeper to that
No its called Joe Maddon. Remember when Brignac never played for a stretch? Yea same thing is happening to Rodriguez. As soon as Brignac starts to slip he’ll ride the bench again.
Why won’t the Rays read the rest of the story?
lol
We were against Justin Verlander. I’ll take any type of win.