The Toronto Blue Jays travelled into Tampa to do battle with the Tampa Bay Rays beginning Friday night for what would be their last series against the Rays on the season.
The series would end an eight game road trip where the Jays were a respectable 3-3 against the American League Central leading Detroit Tigers and the American League East leading New York Yankees.
Coming into Friday’s game against the Rays the Jays had a miserable 4-11 record against their American League East rival.
The Jays did not improve on that record as they lost all three games of the series and finished the year 4-14 against a team in which they have to beat, if they are ever considered to become a contender.
In Friday night’s affair, the Jays were destroyed by a high octane Tampa offense 11-4.
Rays third baseman Evan Longoria led the attack against Toronto starter Scott Richmond and relievers Brian Wolfe & Josh Roenicke going 2-4, with a home run, three runs batted in and three runs scored.
Carl Crawford, Akinori Iwamura & Ben Zobrist all had big games for the Rays as well.
Richmond lasted only two innings, as he was roughed up for five earned runs on seven hits.
Brian Wolfe was also terrible, pitching one inning, allowing three earned runs on four hits while walking two.
Roenicke capped off another miserable performance allowing two runs on three hits.
One highlight of the game came from the Jays bullpen, as Dirk Hayhurst was solid over three innings of long relief, allowing no runs on two hits, while striking out three. Hayhurst’s earned run average is an incredible 1.31 in his limited appearances this season in the majors.
Another minor highlight in the game was the first career run batted in for catcher/first baseman Kyle Phillips, as Phillips doubled in Randy Ruiz for a run in the top of the sixth inning.
“Big Game” James Shields picked up the win for Tampa pushing his record to 10-11 on the season, while Richmond took the loss dropping him to a record of 6-10.
On Saturday evening the Rays had the Blue Jays number yet again, with pitching nemesis Matt Garza dueling Blue Jays left hander Ricky Romero.
Garza has pitched the Jays tough over his career, and in this writer’s opinion is the pitcher the Jays have the most problems with aside from Boston Red Sox starter Jon Lester.
Since joining the Rays at the beginning of last season, Garza holds a 6-2 record against the Blue Jays and is 3-0 against Toronto this season.
Saturday night was another terrific performance by Garza against the Jays.
Garza lasted 7.1 innings, allowing no runs on three hits, while walking six and striking out ten. Garza ended a personal worst nine game winless streak.
Upon being pulled from the game by Rays manager Joe Maddon, Garza showed his emotional side bursting out in anger to himself, but Garza had nothing to be angry about as the Rays bullpen sealed the deal for the right hander as Russ Springer, Randy Choate & Dan Wheeler finished out the game for the Tampa victory.
Blue Jays rookie Ricky Romero had a shaky first inning in which he allowed four earned runs, but pitched solidly afterwards in the loss. Romero’s final line was six innings pitched, in which he allowed four earned runs on seven hits, walking four and striking out six.
Evan Longoria and Gabe Kapler both went 2-3 for Tampa as this game was an offensive snooze fest.
In Sunday’s series and season finale between the Blue Jays and Rays, Tampa continued their dominance over Toronto ace Roy Halladay. Tampa scored two runs on ten hits against Halladay in a 3-1 victory.
The victory marked the fourth Halladay defeat at the hands of the Rays this season, a remarkable task for any team to accomplish in one season.
Current Rays catcher and former Blue Jays catcher Gregg Zaun had this to say about the Rays success over Halladay:
“Beating him four times in your life is tough,”
“Four times in one year is pretty amazing. He’s unbelievable. He’s by far the best in the game.”
Halladay’s only major mistake came in the bottom of the first inning against Tampa speedster Carl Crawford, who took Halladay deep into the right field stands for a two run blast.
Halladay would not allow another run after the first inning home run, but would still take the loss as the Jays offense was bewildered by Tampa starter David Price.
Price allowed one earned run on three hits, over 6.2 innings pitched.
A bullpen combination of Grant Balfour, Brian Shouse, Dan Wheeler & Russ Springer would cement a bridge to closer J.P Howell who would pick up his seventeenth save on the day.
With the sweep the Jays fell to an awful 66-83 record in 2009, 28.5 games out of the lead in the American League East, a very sad state if you ask me.
The Jays come back home to the Rogers Centre for their final home games of the season.
The Jays begin the home stand with a three game set against the Baltimore Orioles tonight, followed up by their final home series of the season against the Seattle Mariners.
In tonight’s matchup Blue Jays prospect David Purcey will square off against Baltimore youngster Chris Tillman.
In other baseball news:
San Francisco Giants prospect Angel Villalona is the main suspect in the killing of a 25-year-old man in the Dominican Republic.
Angel Villalona turned himself in 12 hours after the man was shot at a bar in the southern coastal city of La Romana.
The 19 year old was considered the Giants' most prized prospect when he signed and was chosen the top prospect in the Arizona Rookie League two years ago.
Chicago Cubs outfielder and head case Milton Bradley was suspended for the remainder of the season yesterday by the team.
The Cubs suspended the outfielder, one day after he criticized the team in a newspaper interview.
Bradley's comments in the article stated the following:
"I need a stable, healthy, enjoyable environment,"
"There's too many people everywhere in your face with a microphone asking the same questions repeatedly.
"Everything is just bashing you. It's just negativity."
Bradley's future with the Cubs is unknown, as Bradley is in the first year of a three-year, $30 million contract that he signed as a free agent last offseason.
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