Speaking calmly and cooly on ESPN Radio this morning, Rangers head man and former fireballer Nolan Ryan said he suspected it would take Rangers hitters two turns around the batting order tonight to get comfortable against Matt Moore.
Make that three turns, and they’re still waiting.
It made so much sense for the Rays to start the young phenom Moore that even the Rangers knew they were in for an early challenge.
But the X-factor was the Rays bats showing up in a big way.
Joe had to laugh. After the 9-0 blowout with two homers from Kelly Shoppach, a reporter asked Shoppach to comment on his rough season at the plate versus how he’s been hitting the last week or so. Shoppach wouldn’t bite and said he’s always confident and if they keep pitching where he’s swinging then he’ll be contributing.
But the reality is Shoppach muscled a low-and-away C. J. Wilson pitch over the wall just to the right of dead center field for the three-run bomb that put the game away in the third inning. That pitch is not one he would have done anything with all season long.
Shoppach routinely tries to pull that ball and whiffs, pulling his hips out and sometimes tossing the bat into the third base stands. But today the Rays got the Shoppach they signed originally, a guy with opposite field power who occasionally will go with a pitch to keep his average acceptable.
If that guy shows up for the rest of the series, and the Rays subsequently remove a black hole from their lineup, then their chances of landing in the ALCS improve dramatically.
Joe doesn’t know whether Evan Longoria was nuts to not take the sure out at home plate after a force out at third or whether he was just a man with a hefty set of balls to try and turn three.
Regardless, it worked, and tonight’s comeback win no doubt was destiny after the Rays’ turned that sixth-inning triple play with the bases loaded.
Later in the home seventh, Joe must admit he cursed up a storm when trailing by one run Matt Joyce wasn’t laying down a bunt with B.J. Upton on second and Longo on first with nobody out. Of course, Joyce drilled MFIKY’s pitch into the right field seats to give the Rays the 5-3 win.
Surely, “the numbers” said to bunt. But as Joe Maddon said last night, sometimes you just have to trust people no matter how much you love the numbers.
Thankfully, he was trusting of Joyce.
What was once a season of what-ifs now feels like the final 10 minutes of a cheezy Hollywood movie with a PG-rated happy ending.
At this point with one or two games to go, if the Rays can’t nail down a Wild Card spot, it’ll be an extraordinarily miserable and maddening offseason of what-ifs featuring Dezmon Jennings, Andy Sonnanstine and many more.
It is generally accepted that the two worst stadium situations in baseball are in Oakland and in St. Pete. And while neither has been pretty for a while, one just got very ugly.
[Josh] Willingham’s agent, Matt Sosnick, told The Chronicle on Saturday that he approached the team last week with various possibilities for a multiyear deal for their top offensive player, and general manager Billy Beane told Sosnick that spending decisions are on hold until a decision comes down about the A’s stadium situation….”We talked about a time frame, given that Billy would like Josh back, but it seems like Billy is sort of hamstrung right now.”
Here the A’s have a key player willing to stay with the club, and the general manager is not allowed to give him a new deal unless the A’s are allowed to move to San Jose.
Like nearly every Rays fan with a pulse, Joe sobbed in his beer when Jeff Niemann looked stiff and awful in the first inning and got yanked for Alex Torres after the opening frame.
Could things have looked any worse? It was as if The Hangman had lowered the noose on the season.
But could Torres have pitched any better over the next five innings?
What an unreal showing by the bullpen.
One might call this 6-2 win a nailbiter, but it was more of head-banger as the Rays smacked their share of feeble ground balls and deflating double plays. And Bossman turned in another baserunning gem getting picked off first with two outs. Then in his typical schizophrenic way, he nearly got picked off first in the eighth but beat the throw to second base from the Jays’ first baseman. At least he’s never boring.
Thankfully, the Rays got to Ricky Romero early and Ben Zobrist’s solo shot in the fourth was enough before Johnny Damon put the game away with a three-run blast in the eighth.
The Red Sox got abused in New York, 9-1, and the Rays are 1 1/2 back. The Sox play two in New York tomorrow. One can only hope the Yanks want to bury the Sox as much as their fans want them to.
The Rays have overcome some very long odds to get back into the playoff race. So when they trailed 5-0 with 1 out in the 8th inning with BJ Upton on first and Evan Longoria at the plate, there was a glimmer of hope that the Rays could pull off another miracle.
But then BJ being BJ did what BJ does. Upton attempted to steal second base…
How bad was it? Let’s count the ways:
One run means nothing there. Upton says he was trying to avoid a double-play. On the season, Longo has hit into 10 double-plays in 546 plate appearances. Baserunners are far more important in that situation than worrying about something that happens less than 2 percent of the time.
Upton slows down about 15 feet before the bag (0:26 mark). Why? We have no idea.
He was out.
Despite being out, Upton vehemently argues the call. He even turns to the dugout and appears to be expecting Joe Maddon to come out arguing. He didn’t
Upton gets ejected.
While watching BJ clap his hands over and over, we couldn’t help but think that was one of those situations where he was arguing just because he knew he had screwed up and was trying to deflect the blame. It didn’t work.
After the game, Maddon made it clear that it was a bad play on Upton’s part.
[Maddon] thought Upton was out and said Upton didn’t necessarily make the safe play...”That’s a situation where, if you’re going to go, you have to be absolutely 100 percent sure you can do it,” Maddon said. “I think if he really reflects on it, he’d probably want to take it back.”
We have always said that BJ’s biggest problem may just be that he is just not very baseball-smart. And this is just the latest example. You have to wonder if the Rays are growing tired of the mistakes.
Last night’s mental miscue in such a critical situation of a crucial game is the sort of play that can lead to Maddon walking into Andrew Friedman’s office and saying he has had enough. Just ask Delmon Young.
Watch this video from attorney Matt Dolman of Dolman Law Group. Common examples of insurance company bad faith are provided. Dolman Law Group has offices in Clearwater, Bradenton and Melbourne.
The GBT – The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.
THE GOOD: Breaking Out. Man, if there was ever a time when the Rays needed an easy win and an offensive outburst, it was last night. This was the kind of game that can get a player feeling good about his swing. Let’s just hope it carries over for a few days. And let’s hope it is not too late…The Double-Nickel. There it was. There was the magic we have all heard about from number 55. In his first big league start, Moore struck out 11 and walked just 1 in 5 innings. And maybe the best part, was the offensive support. Because the Rays scored 13 runs in the first 5 innings, Joe Maddon was able to pull Moore after just 84 pitches…Bossman and Zorilla. If the Rays are going to make the playoffs, they need these two to get hot. And last night was a good start. Combined they went 6-8 with a triple and 2 home runs, driving in 6.
THE BAD: Scrub Relievers. It is not easy to have a 13-0 lead and actually get a little nervous later on. But thanks to Dane de la Rosa giving up 8 hits and 6 runs in just 1.1 innings and Alex Torres giving up 2 runs (1 earned) in 1 inning, that is exactly what happened. And because those two were bleeding runs, Joe Maddon was forced to use three of his regular relievers in the final 2 innings. And now, Joe Cruz, Jake McGee, and Brandon Gomes have worked back-to-back days, which probably leaves their availability for tonight’s game against the Blue Jays in question…Tough To Watch. You would think putting up 15 runs against the Yankees would be fun to watch. But with the ugly taste of the previous two days still lingering, all we could think about was how things would have been different if the Rays got just a couple of those runs in the previous games.
THE TELLING: The Rays trail the Red Sox by 2 games with 6 to go. If the Red Sox go 3-3, the Rays need to go 5-1 just to tie…The Rays magic number to tie is 8…CoolStandings.com gives the Rays a 7.4 percent shot at making the playoffs…Jeff Niemann will start Saturday.
RANDOM THOUGHTS: If the Rays do happen to complete their miracle comeback and make it to the postseason, is there anyway Joe Maddon can keep Matt Moore out of the postseason rotation? Is there any reason to think he is not one of Maddon’s four best pitchers right now?
THE JUNKYARD DOGS WEBTOPIA…
Hey, check it out…We won a “Best of the Bay” award. Awesome. [Creative Loafing]
What if the Rays finish in a 2 or 3-team tie for the Wild Card? Roger Mooney has the tie-breaker scenarios. [Rays Report]
So now Manny Ramirez wants to play again and is willing to serve his 100-game suspension. Tell us again why he didn’t just serve his suspension and then retire? [ESPN]
Overcome a 2.5 game deficit with 7 to play? It has been done before. [TampaBay.com]
Watching Durham Bulls Baseball gives a solid review of each of the top players at triple-A Durham. [WDBB]
Sorry, but the Rays have made up too damn much ground to turn back now. The Sox aren’t better — not now anyway — and the Rays are two back with 10 to go.
As the late Tug McGraw coined for the 1973 Mets, “Ya Gotta Believe.”
Why not the Rays? Why not? Joe can’t answer the question.
Oh, the irony of the bullpen and the bats pulling the Rays through the biggest game of the season after David Price took an early line drive off the chest today.
After Matt Moore delivered his wicked heat and cardiac moments yesterday, the Rays unleashed their scary pen on the Sox and walked out alive with an 8-5 win.
Cue the “What if Desmon Jennings was on the roster sooner?” calls to sports radio tomorrow. The man is electric. The Rays have the day off Monday and the Sox have two at home against the O’s.
The Sox have won two of their last 11. Good luck turning it around, fellas.
Yesterday we posted a video of Evan Longoria in which he took something from a young female fan in the front row of Thursday’s game against the Red Sox. We were hoping it was her grandmother’s Chowder recipe. It turns out it was just a lucky trinket…
Longoria sent out this message on Twitter:
to clear the air, it was a lucky trinket, that didn’t work! I struck out haha. And I gave it back
And then we found this earlier message that appeared to be from the young lady in question:
Dear [Evan Longoria] thank you for your kind gesture of giving back my trinket last night… i was experiencing sellers remorse
We contacted the young lady and she was kind enough to send along a picture of the trinker…
Yeah, Joe Maddon knows what he’s doing. The guy’s a miracle worker. But this game wasn’t played with the urgency it called for.
C’mon. The Rays get runners on first and second with nobody out in the seventh down 4-2 and Maddon isn’t going to have Casey Kotchman lay down a bunt to move the runners and pressure the infield and another crappy starter the Rays made look like Steve Carlton. (Jeremy Guthrie? Really?)
Was Maddon looking for a big inning out of John Jaso and Reid Brignac behind Kotch?
The Matt Moore sighting was exciting and depressing at the same time. Joe only hopes the kid’s confidence isn’t busted up. Especially since he’ll be put in even tougher spots (hopefully) against the Red Sox.
And how Jaso and Wade Davis don’t settle on an 0-2 pitch that can’t be taken out of the ballpark is another one of the great 2011 mysteries.
So here it is: four games back of the Sox and a four game series at Fenway starting tomorrow. Every Rays fan would have had wet dreams over such a fantasy entering the season. Try to forget about how the Rays got here and enjoy it.
Speaking calmly and cooly on ESPN Radio this morning, Rangers head man and former fireballer Nolan Ryan said he suspected it would take Rangers hitters two turns around the batting order tonight to get comfortable against Matt Moore.
