HOME SWEEP HOME:
JAYS RETRIEVE BROOM FROM RAYS,
USE IT ON TOUGH NATIONALS
On one hand, it was a good thing the Blue Jays had a day off to lick their wounds and hit the batting cage to try to shake off the Tampa Torpor that hit them once again this week. On the other hand, it was a bad thing for the Washington Nationals that the Jays…
RAYS DEFLATE SOARING JAYS
IN TYPICAL TAMPA TAKEDOWN
If anybody was wondering who that dirty, bedraggled flock of birds was limping back into town Wednesday night looking like they were returning from the jungles of Central America rather than from sunny Florida, why, it was our very own Toronto Blue Jays. After swaggering out of town on the wings of a rousing four-game…
BIRD BRAWL FIZZLES
AS JAYS SWEEP ORIOLES AT HOME
Used to be, it was really something when the Toronto Blue Jays and the Baltimore Orioles got together. Why, even as recently as the American League Wild Card game in 2016, the only real difference between the teams was the strange failure of Baltimore manager Buck Showalter to use the best closer in baseball in…
GAMES 60 AND 61: JUNE FIFTH AND SIXTH:
YANKEES 7,3, BLUE JAYS 2/0:
NEW YORK’S LATE POWER, BULLPEN
DECIDE PITCHERS’ DUELS
So the Yankees came to town this week and took two of two from the Blue Jays, powered by their superior brawn and superb bullpen. Ho hum. But it wasn't really like that at all, as it turned out, because these two games were great pitchers' duels between equally effective starting pitchers. Both games were…
GAMES 57-59, JUNE FIRST TO THIRD:
TIGERS 5/7/4, JAYS 2/4/8:
SANCHEZ’ BEST OUTING AVERTS
TIGERS’ MOTOWN BEATDOWN
I was born in Detroit, and lived there until I was 22 years old. My father regularly took the various remnants of our large brood to one or two ball games a year at Tiger Stadium, preferably for doubleheaders, first to get more value for his ticket bucks, and second to keep us out of…
GAMES 55 TO 57, MAY 28TH TO 30TH:
RED SOX 8/8/6, JAYS 3/3/4:
THE CURSE OF THE FENS:
WILL TORONTO EVER WIN IN BOSTON?
Honestly, folks, is there some kind of a perverse twist on the Curse of the Babe going on here? I can accept that Boston has the best record in baseball and Toronto has, well, not played up to hopes/expectations for the last month. I can accept that in the circumstances it's not surprising that the…
GAMES 51 TO 54, MAY 25-27:
BLUE JAYS 6/1/5, PHILLIES 5/2/3
TURN-AROUND WEEKEND IN PHILLY?
JAYS’ HURLERS KEY SERIES WIN
Was that all Toronto needed, to get out of town? Playing in the pretty confines of Philadelphia's cozy ballpark, yet another space named after a greedy financial institution, was all it took to turn the Toronto Turkeys of Thursday afteroon's embarrassment at home back into a flock of Blue Jays who can fly with the…
GAMES 49 AND 50, MAY 23RD AND 24TH:
ANGELS 5,8, BLUE JAYS 4,1:
JAYS BLOW LEAD,
THEN BLOW SERIES WITH ANGELS
WEDNESDAY NIGHT PAIN: Toronto seems to have fallen into a pattern of loss: one good win, in most series, at least one tough loss, and a game of lay-down-and-die. Tuesday night the Jays scored early on some hard-hit balls, albeit with some help from the Angels, and Jay Happ was masterful. Toronto looked like the…
GAME FORTY-EIGHT: MAY 23RD:
BLUE JAYS 5, ANGELS 3:
HAPP SOLID AGAIN AS
MORALES, DONALDSON KEY WIN
When Kevin Pillar almost lined into a double play five batters into last night's game against the Angels, threatening to cut short a promising start, my Spidey sense was alerted to the possibility that it was going to happen again, this awful melange of bad luck and poor play by the Blue Jays. Then, with…
GAMES 42 AND 43: MAY 15TH AND 16TH:
METS 12/1, BLUE JAYS 12/2:
SHOULD WE OPEN THE DOME?
TORONTO HITTERS RAKIN’ IN THE RAIN
TUESDAY BEAT DOWN UNDER THE STORM CLOUDS: In my last piece I made a bad joke about the weather forecast for the two-game series between the Blue Jays and the New York Mets Tuesday and Wednesday. I mentioned that the Mets' ballyard is in Flushing, and that it was supposed to be wet. Sorry about…