Athletics 2, Blue Jays 0: A Relatively Rare Bullpen-Day Loss

honestly a little surprised at how Braydon Fisher grips
his knuckle curve but that's good; I am here to learn

I'm sure "bulk guy" Michael Lorenzen would have rather not allowed those two runs (one each in the third and fourth), and I imagine he would have hoped to have added more bulk to the game than his two-and-two-thirds innings provided, but you'd definitely have to say that this was another bullpen day that worked: six guys (Fisher, Lorenzen, Sewald, Mantiply, Rogers, and Varland) allowed a combined two runs on just four hits and two walks, and as I look at the box score now (which always offers something pleasingly different than our direct experience of the game itself, doesn't it?), I learn that it was Lorenzen who allowed all four of those hits, and one of those walks, meaning I guess that the walk issued by Tyler Rogers in the seventh was the only other A's batter to have reached in the whole game? Really? Man, everybody did even better than I'd thought! Except for the the bats, though, the beleaguered bats: six hits, three walks, but a couple of double plays, and a couple of deep fly balls that died on the track, and that's how you end up shut-out on a day where almost anything at all would have been enough to take the series and turn a totally fine five-and-four road trip into a profoundly triumphant six-and-three one, but alas. I was hoping we might benefit from a little nominative determinism when A's pitcher Scott Blewett entered the game, but no. 

At least it all happened on a day when the teams directly ahead of us (Cleveland) and behind (Texas) both lost (we extend our thanks to the Orioles and Mariners respectively), and so we remain a game back of the Guardians as we head into a weekend series against the Orioles, whom we actually play a bunch over these final fifteen games (six times!). If this weekend goes poorly for the Orioles, that might be more or less it for them; if it goes poorly for us, there's a chance we're still in it, but I would like our chances a whole lot more were we able to grab two out of three. It looks like we'll have Cease and Soriano ready to go, and Friday night, if I am not mistaken, is shaping up to be Max Scherzer vs. Chris Bassitt, which sounds pretty neat to me. September baseball! Scoreboard watching! A generalized sense of unease! Let's go!  

KS