Friday, September 6, 2019

#142 - Toronto Blue Jays (55-86) at Tampa Bay Rays (83-59)


Friday, September 6, 2019 | 7:10 pm
Tropicana Field | St. Petersburg, FL

Clay Buchholz (1-3, 5.45, 1.35) vs. Brendan McKay (2-3, 5.55, 1.49)


PREAMBLE:

The Blue Jays look to even things up in tonight's second game of a four-game series against the wild-card leading Rays.  The Jays are riding a four-game losing streak and the Rays are in a 7-1 stretch as they fight to hold off the Athletics and Indians for one of two wild card spots.

Clay Buchholz is coming off his first win in a full year and hopefully his next win doesn't take anywhere near as long to come... like, tonight perhaps?  He'll face Brendan McKay, who is back up after a stint on the injured list and lost 4-3 to the Jays on August 7th in his one previous appearance against the Jays.  Buchholz is 9-8, 2.62 in 24 previous starts against the Rays.


NOTES:

Ho hum.  Just riding out the stretch as the Jays look to simultaneously improve their draft position while also avoiding 100 losses and giving their rookies as many looks as possible. 

Vlad a gud swimmer. 
Bo a gud HR hitter.
Reese a gud catcher at catching runners well before they arrive at 2nd base.
The rest of the team, well ...

Cool happening in last night's Miami-Pittsburgh game:  Brian Moran of the Marlins made his major-league debut at the age of 30, and the second batter he faced just happened to be his brother, Colin.  First time in MLB history a pitcher faced his brother in his debut.  Brian 1, Colin 0 as Brian struck out Colin.


LINEUPS:


This is your "dog days of September" game threat.