Do not mess with the Fighting Blue Jays.
It was the top of the eighth inning, and the Red Sox had just increased their lead to 6-2 - they did this when Manny Ramirez hit his second homer of the night (and the season). He struck the blow off Scott Schoeneweis. This was just the third homer Schoeneweis has allowed since becoming a Blue Jay, and I'm proud to say I was in the house for all three (the others, inexplicably enough, came in back to back at bats in that wild 12-9 game against the Royals last May.)
Jason Frasor relieved Schoeneweis. After striking out Nixon and Varitek , Frasor gave up a single to Lowell and a walk to Harris. He then threw a 70 mph curveball to Alex Gonzalez that didn't curve at all, glancing off the Boston shortstop's helmet.
When a curveball doesn't curve and hits the batter - it's no big deal. You're not even supposed to rub it. If anything, you ought to be a little embarrassed at not being agile enough to dodge the thing, as Troy Glaus and several other Blue Jay hitters had done successfully earlier in the evening when Josh Beckett's curveballs just floated up there in the vicinity of the batter's head. Gonzalez certainly appeared to think nothing of it. He trotted promptly to first base, loading the sacks for Kevin Youkilis who eventually struck out to end the inning.
With his first pitch in the bottom of the eighth, Josh Beckett drilled Aaron Hill with a 93 mph fastball. Huh?
It was definitely a pitch that got us going. It got everything going for us.
-Vernon Wells
Whether Beckett did it on purpose or not it got us going.
- Lyle Overbay
Aaron Hill, of course, is off to a tough enough start anyway. In his first at bat tonight, he grounded what looked like a single to left - except Mike Lowell dived to his left to snag the ball, rolled over, and threw to first on a hop in time to nip Hill for the out. In his second at bat, he grounded what looked like a single to right - except this time it was Kevin Youkilis with the diving stop and the feed to Beckett covering to get the out. After that inning, Eric Hinske paused on his way out to right field to give Hill a pat on the back and, presumably, the old "keep-yer-chin-up" words of encouragement. Sooner or later, all of us fall below the Mendoza Line. This too shall pass. Hinske, of course, is arguably the team's fifth best hitter, he came into the game hitting .375, and he's scuffling for playing time. But it's Aaron Hill who needs a little support these days.
Naturally, the man who stepped up to avenge the second baseman was Russ Adams, who stoutly yanked a 2-1 pitch over the wall in the RF corner. Suddenly it was a 6-4 game, and much more interesting to contemplate.
Beckett fanned Catalanotto, but Vernon Wells continued the uprising, driving an 0-1 pitch out over the wall in right-centre. Josh Beckett, pitching a three-hitter and cruising with a four run lead, just had to go tug on Superman's cape. It was now a one-run game, and Troy Glaus, Mighty Troy, was the next hitter. Francona got Beckett the hell out of there and summoned Mike Timlin.
Timlin started Glaus off with an 89 mph fastball. I remember thinking when I saw that - man! Mike Timlin is getting old. He used to throw 94-95, all the time. He humped his next one up there at 92 mph, and Glaus fouled it off. Mighty Troy then crushed an 0-2 pitch - an 0-2 pitch! -way, way back into the seats in left-centre. And Josh Beckett wasn't going to get his fourth win of 2006 tonight.
And justice prevailed everywhere in the universe. For that brief moment in time, anyway.
The putz.
This was a humdinger of a ballgame from the very start, although apparently Jerry Howarth didn't officially pronounce it a "honey of a game" until the ninth inning. The pitching matchup was fascinating - Beckett and Burnett, two young studs who both throw harder than Roy Halladay. Don't see that every day. Team mates for years with the Marlins, both members of the 2003 champs (Beckett the hero, Burnett the DL inhabitant).
When was the last time two men who won World Series rings together started against each other? In Toronto, that is?
Well, it was almost exactly two years ago - two years minus a day, on April 22, 2004. There are very few happy memories of the Season from Hell, but one of the bright spots was surely the Chris Gomez game, when he touched up Curt Schilling for a grand slam to break up a 3-3 tie. The other starting pitcher on that night was Schilling's teammate from Arizona's 2001 champs, Miguel Batista.
Back to tonight's game. When you watch A.J. Burnett throw a baseball, you instantly understand why people get so excited. The ball just explodes out of his hand, at an ungodly velocity, with lots of movement. Then he throws a nasty, nasty curve in the low 80s. And then, just for fun, he zips in a changeup at roughly the speed of Josh Towers' heater. And it's not just the raw tools that make grown baseball men drool - it's that all of this seems to come so effortlessly to him. Burnett's a big guy, but Beckett and Halladay and Clemens are even bigger, and their work seems to involve much more exertion. They look like they're really working at it. Burnett looks like he's playing catch.
Although his elbow sure seems to think there's a lot of work involved...
Early on, Beckett was trying very hard to establish his curveball, which he throws generally around 75 mph. He was trying much harder to establish it because he couldn't throw it for a strike. It kept drifting up there near the hitter's head. Luckily for him, he throws a moving fastball at around 96 mph, and he was able to get by with just that until he got the curve working, around the third or fourth inning. Burnett seemed to have everything working... until there were runners on base. It seemed to put him off his feed. He throws just as hard from the stretch, but his pace, which is not all that brisk to start with, slows dramatically. And behold! - the spirit of Juan Guzman walks the Rogers Centre again..
This is your TDIB today, gang - all Blue Jays! Hey, it was a great ball game. I'll look at the rest of the majors... some other time. Meanwhile, a few more random notes from last night's contest....
Through nine innings, Russ Adams played a very nice shortstop, covering lots of ground and delivering every throw to first right on the money. Finally, on Lowell's deep grounder in the tenth, Adams airmailed a long throw across the diamond - but Overbay climbed the ladder, speared it, and landed on the bag in time to get the out. Olerud is the only other first baseman we've seen here who makes that play.
Speaking of defense, this was my first good look at Eric Hinske in right field. He had a fairly quiet night out there - he was fooled, as most outfielders would be, when Gonzalez broke his bat hitting a fly ball in the fourth, but the Dude recovered and hustled in to make the catch. And he hung with Lowell's opposite field shot in the sixth that kept drifting away from him - he ended up making a pretty nice play on it. He's not Rios, and he might be better suited to LF, but he's not going to hurt the ball club out there.
With Burnett gone after four, six relievers held the Red Sox to three runs over eight innings, and three of them should be singled out for special High Praise. Vinnie Chulk seems to be over his first week diffculties, and retired all five men he faced. B.J. Ryan worked two innings in a tie game against the heart of the Boston lineup, and retired all six men he faced. His ninth inning battle with Manny Ramirez was especially fun. And Justin Speier's second inning saw him come out to face David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez to start the twelfth inning, and strike out both of them.
Speaking of relievers - Keith Foulke took the loss, and I hear that there isn't a lot of cartilage left in those knees - nevertheless, he looked a lot more like the Foulke I remember than that guy who was wearing his uniform in 2005. His fastball was back up in the high 80s, and it was enough to set up what is still as sick a change of speed as anybody throws. He struck out Adams swinging at a 72 mph changeup that was utterly perfect - the arm action was so good, the ball looked exactly like a fastball, but it just wasn't there. There is no hitter anywhere who would not be fooled, it's simply a devastating pitch. If his body holds up, Boston's got some interesting options.....
Rudy Seanez gave up Overbay's game winning double, scoring Troy Glaus from first - and has anyone else noticed how athletic Glaus is for a guy who's... well, enormous. He's way, way bigger than Carlos Delgado, for example. Anyway, Seanez made his ML debut way back in 1989, the same year SkyDome opened for baseball. And before the game started, while we were all watching an enjoyable clip of highlights from the first 30 years of Blue Jays baseball, some of us started wondering.
Who is still out there, playing major league ball, who actually played at old Exhibition Stadium?
There's your challenge today, Bauxites. I give you Julio Franco and David Wells - they both played at the Ex, and they're both still active. Who else?
https://www.battersbox.ca/article.php?story=20060422012135286