The Blue Jays came out in the rubber match like it just a lazy Sunday afternoon against the woeful Astros who if U did not know better came into this series with 6 runs scored in their last 4 games and the young buck Kyle Drabek was on the hill who the Jays are 5-3 coming into this game with him on the mound.
In the bottom of the second inning the focus was nowhere near Rajai Davis when after doubling with one out he was caught putting on his gloves as the Astros pitcher Wandy Rodriguez to Edwin Encarnacion who doubled but because the speedy Davis was not ready he could only advance to third and was unable to score because Jayson Nix struck out and Yunel Escobar pop up to the catcher to end the inning as Edwin's hit was the only hit with a runner in scoring position as the Jays were 1 for 12 in that stat today. in a 1-1 tie in the top of the 5 inning with one out Angel Sanchez sent a lazy fly ball to shallow center field and Rajai Davis let it just drop right in front of him and Yunel Escobar was there too and it was a very costly blunder because the next batter Hunter Pence who leads the Astros in both homers and RBIs added to both those stats to put the Astros in a 3-1 lead and gave them enough runs to win the game. With Wilton Lopez who was having a hard time finding the plate even with an extremely extended strike zone the white chalk of the batters box was being called a strike and in 1.1 inning the Jays could not take advantage of him and it got so bad for Lopez that Astros manager came out with a 2-1 count on J.P. with one out in the eighth inning and brought in closer for now Mark Melancon as the Astros have blown 11 saves so far this season. So Mark Melancon comes in and the announcers on Sportsnet say that he a strike throwing pitcher and of course the Jays would have an idea of this and hack away at anything close to the plate but instead they are watching the pitches as J.P. was caught looking while Rajai Davis was caught looking at strikes and Mark Melancon made it extremely easy on the Jays hitter as he basically said if I get the ball to the plate it is going to be a strike as the balls to Davis where bouncing in front of the plate. It was no easier to watch the Jays hitters take strikes in the 9 inning and it was so obvious that he was a strike throwing pitcher that the announcer reinstated that he was a strike throwing pitcher and Edwin watched pitch one for a strike and was behind in the count and just had to battle before grounding out for out number 1. Then pinch hitter Eric Thames came to the plate and watch the first 4 pitches he saw as he saw Melancon's fourth ball since coming into the game and then 2 strikes before his 5 ball of the afternoon and then Thames struck out swinging on the only pitch he offered at in the at bat for out number 2. Yunel Escobar came to the plate and watched strike one and then singled to keep the game going and then Cory Patterson after watching the first pitch (a ball) doubled which put runners on second and third with Bautista up only problem was first base was empty so they walked him to get to Arron Hill who was a single could win the game for the Jays so after watching strike one he grounded the next pitch to Chris Johnson who throw to Brett Wallace to end the game.
So the Jays were not mentally into the game and it showed but Kyle Drabek also gave up 8 hits and 3 walks and one that he would like back that accounted for 2 of the 3 runs he gave up to his home town Astros in 6 innings of work and had at least a runner on almost all innings as his 6 pitch fourth inning was his only 1-2-3 inning and he had a number multi-runners innings as well. The Jays could not produce any runs as the only runs came on solo homers to Juan Rivera in the third to tie it at 1 all with 2 outs and J.P. singled and Davis walked but Encarnacion flied to end the inning and then J.P lead off the sixth inning with his 8 homer of the season but nobody else could on base that inning to get a rally going.
The Jays head to the Bronx to face the Yanks in the first of three before coming home for some more home cooking and someone needs to find that cook and fire him because that home cookings not helping
Tom Mehegan
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