 |
| on Bo-and-2, even |
I felt pretty sure that Bo Bichette's second opposite-field home run of the night -- this one a three-run shot in a four-run sixth -- was going to be enough to put the Orioles away, but Rougned Odor's two-run laser off of the ultra-reliable Yimi Garcia in the bottom of the eighth confirmed my own long-held suspicion that I am, in fact, a fool. Alek Manoah's three runs on eight hits (just one walk) through five, though a little short of his usual standard, was not really the problem. And Anthony Bass had a nice inning in relief. You definitely don't expect to see Cimber and Garcia give up three runs between them in two innings of relief, but it's gonna happen sometimes, I suppose. What a drag! I joined this one late, and so missed the triple-play-that-wasn't (Merrifield was ruled to have smothered the ball, as opposed to having caught it), but tuned in plenty of time to catch the forty-five-minute rain delay fight after the Blue Jays big (half-)inning. The final game of the series was rained out, too, which is fine by me, given how this has been going. The Orioles are the AL East's best team since the break, and although the Blue Jays have been the division's second best in that time, it is pretty clear who has been the greater agent of chaos. Hey, here's something: the Blue Jays' 60-50 record through 110 games this season is exactly the same as their 2021 season to that same point. Weird, right? I have been thinking about how, if the Blue Jays end up at 91 wins (or thereabouts) again this season, they might actually be setting up for a significantly better 2023, in that this year's 90-ish win team (let us hope; let us dream) has been that with down years from both Vladdy and Bo, both of whom I think we can reasonably expect to perform a little better next year, and without a Cy Young season from Robbie Ray, or Marcus Semien's best offensive season from an AL second-baseman ever. If these 2022 Blue Jays, whose only pending losses via free agency are David Phelps (whom we all like) and Ross Stripling (whom we all really like), can add a little more to an already much-improved pen, toss in another starting arm of somewhere near league-average value, and look forward to even slightly better performances from our young bats next year, maybe next year is totally the year? If this sounds like I am already conceding this, our present season, please believe me that I am not, in that I am still of the view that we should totally nab a Wild Card spot. And everything that follows is of course one big merry/horrendous roll of the dice.
KS
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