EMK19

Yeah, those Orioles are crashing real hard for sure... I'm always uneasy with these division games for some reason though, although we've done decent within the division so far this year... But for sure those Yankees games will be the key ones.

Really glad for Goins for his past month and a week or so, he's filled Travis' shoes adequately and then some. Hopefully he can keep it up, not necessarily his hits but just his approach at the plate to get on base with walks and such. And no need to go on about his D of course... pretty much at an elite level. Anyways... man those Indians are tough... totally different from teams like Angels who were struggling badly or Tigers who are basically just mailing it in. Real good preparation for us going into a tough pennant race till the end. They may even fight for that second wild card spot at this pace, who knows... just some awesome pitching combined with timely hitting. I'm glad we had just enough to beat out a real good team today, which is what we need to do as a playoff calibre team.

On one hand I do feel that we put bit too much pressure initially on Tulo coming in by asking him to do all these things that he's never done before (leading off, DHing), all the while he deals with his first major trade of his career AND adjusting to all these pitchers in a new league that he hadn't seen much of before... I think it all likely played a part in his initial inconsistencies at the plate in his first month as a Blue Jay... Thus I think giving him a breather in batting him 5th for the time being is a good idea. It also gives EE, who is red hot right now, a better protection than someone more inconsistent currently like Smoak/Martin... On the other hand though I do think Revere is better suited in this particular lineup placed at the 7th spot, as it maximizes his SB potential giving our 8/9 hitters a better chance of driving him in with a simple single instead of relying on the extra base hits all the time... Whenever he's batted 9th or 1st and got on base, it looked as if he's really uneasy with the idea of stealing a base, understandably so with 4 straight great hitters with extra base hit potential coming up after him. I feel that Revere's SB talents, being one of the better ones in the league, should not go wasted and think that he should be placed in the lineup where that talent can be most comfortably and efficiently utilized. But if we go this route, Tulo sort of becomes your leadoff hitter by default there as there isn't really anyone else suited for the role right now. I guess maybe Martin, or perhaps Travis if/when he comes back can also be considered at leadoff, but then we also gotta wonder if we really want to further tinker and experiment with the lineup so often this late in the season.... If Gibby's line of thought is same as mine here then I can see how he's been kind of unsure and uneasy about this whole situation...

Hopefully it'll be like our '93 run where Yankees couldn't take advantage of any of our slips down the stretch drive

Tough game we had. Salazar had his stuff and we did the best we could do to hit him. Unfortunately most were 1 or 2 out rallys without much margin for error. Can't fault our hitters, just great pitching by the Indians (Albeit inconsistent strike zone). Great to see Goins continue hitting and to see EE continue his hit streak. Wonder if Tulo goes back to leading off tm now though... As for pitching, pretty much the same thing, kudos to Indians for getting to Price... Price was decent but not the most pinpoint as we've often seen him before, although he was squeezed by a tight zone as well... One thing that lost the game today I feel is our over eagerness in fielding... Bautista, like the rangers game where the ball rolled under him, as well as Donaldson at 3rd today, seemed too preoccupied with setting up to throw the ball as fast as possible rather than making a surehanded grab of the ball first, leading to those late runs. I understand that they're aggressive ballplayers and are on a high right now due to our run, but it's perhaps time to calm things down a bit out there in the field. At least Yanks didn't gain ground today. Hopefully the offence breaks out again tm, and hope that Estrada will continue to pitch the way he has.

Geez what's up with all the bugs out there... It's like that 1989 game again where they had to suspend play for a bit to close the roof cuz of all those bugs...

Personally like the move. We may as well tinker with the lineup while we have some breathing room to see what works, rather than later in September or something. It's not like they can't go back on the decision, we can always go back to putting Tulo leadoff again if we feel that this move doesn't work.

Revere reminds me of Allen Iverson in his interviews lol...

EE ties the single game Blue Jay RBI record with nine with Roy Howell who did it... way back in our inaugural year

Just an awesome game there. Enjoyed it a lot, even just from that atmosphere in the stadium alone actually... Raining hats... Wish I was there in person. Let's complete that sweep tm!

Tigers to have a 14-run 9th inning to tie it only for EE to complete his home run cycle in the bottom of the inning to walk it off in the most dramatic fashion possible! .....nah. Edit: dang wilner beat me to it...

EE misses his shot at 4... Damn.

Carrera got subbed in for Bats apparently so he'll have to hit a HR. for EE to get a shot at the HR cycle.. (Or a sac fly but thats even less likely)

Guessing Tulo wants that one more at bat to redeem his blah day at the plate.

...And there I was yesterday worrying about Buck broadcasting drunk... Lol... Sorry Buck.

Oh right! Dumb me. Tulo, JD, Joey bats, y'all know what to do! Edit: forgot JD was subbed out. Penny then.

Too bad EE can't have a shot at a HR cycle, not possible since he's up 4th next inning which means someone has to be on base for his at bat, preventing that solo homer.. Lol

...aaaand a hit

This has to be the best feel good victory in the past 20 years... Damn... ...until that playoff clinching game later this year

I don't mind Buck as play by play guy but I am genuinely concerned with how off he's been lately in consistently calling the pitches and counts totally wrong, and now he's even screwing up simple things like player names, like calling Mark Lowe Derek a few days ago for example... Prob his mind/memory getting too foggy with age... I do think he was always better in an analyst role like he was in the 90's anyways and feel that's the role he should probably go back to. My dream would be to have the reunion of the old TSN combination of Jim Hughson and Buck, but obviously that ain't gonna be possible... Loved Jim calling baseball games before he went over to calling hockey full time for good...

Jays really overuse that blue alternate jersey... I don't mind the jersey itself but they wear it too often IMO, almost as if they forgot their grey aways existed. They must wear their alternates more often than any other team in the majors..

I arrived at 10:30 or so for the white panel cap day (sitting at 500 level) and got it with no problems. On the other hand I arrived at around 11:30am for the welcome mat day (that infamous vs KC bench clearing game) and did not get it. I couldn't care less about the welcome mat though so it didn't bother me at all (except when some fans in the right field threw their mats onto the field when Sanchez got ejected and the benches cleared; what a waste!)

Of course I kid, I kid. Although if we are in a total emergency situation where every conventional option at C somehow went down, there we go, we do have a last resort option... Funny thing is earlier on we did have both Martin and Navarro playing at the same time with one of them DH'ing quite a few times this year... so clearly they haven't really been worried about losing the DH spot should one of them go down...

With the pitcher batting the next two games in the NL, I dunno, I'm thinking it'll be a position player that is more flexible than just C/1B (which we already have plenty of) like Thole. I'm sure Thole will be up in September to catch Dickey, just don't think right now will be the time.

Hey all, Just a serious question here about the popular issue lately about batting Tulo at leadoff. I do realize there are two completely different school of thoughts for this, and I understand both sides of the argument, one side preferring to always have your best hitters get the most at bats and him only really batting first once a game usually, and the other side wanting Tulo to bat at a spot he would be more comfortable (having played in all of his career in the middle of the order) and have him in better position to drive in runs. The question is then, for those who are for Tulo continuing to bat leadoff, how long do you see us doing this for, for rest of his time with the Blue Jays here on? Do we continue to do this as long as we have the big three of JD, Bats and EE following him, then maybe considering a move if one or more of them goes? Or is it more due to the fact that there isn't a better hitter right now that you'd rather want leading off instead of Tulo? (since I know lot of people aren't fans of Revere leading off in his place due to his lower walk rate as well). For example, when Travis comes back, would you guys say that he makes a better case of having Tulo further down in the order? Or do you guys think we still bat Tulo first even then? I'm personally of the thought that while I don't mind Tulo leading off, we also shouldn't be completely closed off to trying something else different... I mean, it's not like we can't change back to Tulo hitting leadoff once we take him out of there or anything, I'm thinking that it's not a bad time to give a different lineup a try right now with our 5/6th hitters struggling to hit consistently the past few weeks (by bumping one of the big hitters down one notch). While we're on the subject, there's also the case of Ben Revere; we all know he's eventually going to start hitting better as his career numbers would indicate, and that he is one of the better SB threats in the league when he is on the base; right now in the 9th spot, with the big 4 following him, he's rarely had the chance to showcase that talent at all. I'm not necessarily thinking just the leadoff spot for him, but how about maybe bumping him up to 7 spot or so where bottom hitters can have a better chance of driving him in with a SB/a simple base hit? I just feel that he does have that great SB potential that we should make better use out of it... Would really like to hear all thoughts on this long going debate going on. Thanks in advance.