Nine Tonight

Well, Nine Last Night, technically. But nine more tonight wouldn't hurt, either. Plus, anytime I get the chance to name a blog post after that amazing Bob Seger album, I'll gladly take that opportunity. The Bucs offense woke up last night, J-Mac pitched well enough despite one bad inning, and Monday's 8-3 loss was avenged by a 9-3 W, also stopping the 4 game skid.

After a slight delay due to more ceremonies honoring the 1971 World Series Champions, the game was under way and J-Mac wasted no time mowing down the first three Orioles batters he faced. The  bats followed McDonald's arm and got an early jump when Tabata and Josh "Ole" Harrison smacked back to back singles to put 2 on and 0 out for the Birthday Boy GI Jones. The big fellow didn't wait long to celebrate his 30th human year, whacking a 2 run double to the RCF gap. Cutch, in the cleanup spot, sac bunted Jones to third and the Pride of PR did what he does best, this time with a sac fly. Buc 3, O's 0 after 1. The Orioles had 2 on with 2 out in the 2nd but J-Mac slammed the door and ended the inning unscathed. The Bucs drew more blood in their part of the 2nd when Cedeno was driven in by Tabata after a nice bunt from J-Mac moved Ronny to second.

McDonald once again faced 2 on and 2 out in the 3rd but Derek Lee couldn't get the run home and the Bucs came up in the 3rd with a 4-0 lead. After a GI Jones groundout, Cutch walked and the Pride of PR singled, with Cutch zipping into third. Xavier Paul hit  a sac fly to make it 5-0 Bucs after 3. J-Mac made it out of the 4th with no damage and the Bucs went down 1-2-3 in the bottom of the inning. In the 5th, the O's finally got to McDonald, when J.J. Hardy led off with a solo shot  followed by a Nick Markakis single and an Adam Jones HR to cut the lead to 5-3. After getting Derek Lee, J-Mac gave up a single to Wieters but got Luke Scott to ground out to put Wieters on 2nd with 2 outs. Jake Taylor had seen enough and pulled J-Mac in favor of Future All-Star Chris Resop, leaving McDonald 1 out shy of being the pitcher of record. Resop got the last out and went on to work a scoreless 6th before giving way to Tony Watson in the 7th. Watson, who I can't say enough about, got the O's in order, bringing up the Bucs after the 7th inning stretch.

With Ole Harrison on 2nd base after leading off with a single and Cutch on first after a 1 out walk, the Pride of PR drove a one hop laser to 3rd. Mark Reynolds had trouble handling it, appearing to me that he turned his glove the wrong way and failed to use proper fundamentals in getting over top of the ball, and the Bucs had the bases loaded. Reynold's error was his league leading 16th of the season, which Mr. Sunshine pridefully boasted is " BY FAR the most in the Majors!!!!". Actually, while Reynolds does lead the league in errors, he is 1 ahead of Starling Castro and 2 ahead of Elvis Andrus. I wouldn't consider that a wide margin, considering Andrus's 14 Errors is the same amount Kdro was on pace for when he went to the DL. For some reason, this broadcast team HATES Mark Reynolds. Monday night they made fun of him for striking out so much and Tuesday featured a Brown-gasm over the number of errors he has made. With his numbers, he would lead the Bucs in HR and be 2nd in RBI's right now.

Moving on.

Xavier Paul slashed a floating single to left to bring in Ole Harrison but it wasn't deep enough to score Cutch, but the Bucs still opened up the lead to 6-3. Up next was good old Ronny Cedeno and this at-bat was one for the ages. I don't know if he did this on his own or if the dugout signals didn't translate from English to Spanish. Hell, maybe Jake Taylor told him to do it, or maybe Ronny Cedeno just has a painfully low baseball IQ. However, with the bases loaded and 1 out in a 6-3 game and the ML leader in fielding % among catchers behind the plate, Ronny freaking Cedeno freaking bunted the freaking ball into the freaking ground in front of home freaking plate. Maybe I am overreacting, maybe this wasn't nearly as dumb as it looked. Maybe I am the idiot or was taught wrong. But I just don't see how it was a good idea to bunt the ball WITH A FORCE AT EVERY FREAKING BASE, including the one 2 feet from where it landed.

Anyhow, Wieters neatly collected the ball, stepped on the plate and fired to first in plenty of time to nab Cedeno for the 2-3 inning ending double play. Not so fast, Hoss. The homeplate umpire ruled the ball was foul, and Cedeno had another try. Replay showed the ball was fair and the Bucs caught a break but Karma had her way with Ronny when he hit into a 4-6-3 DP to end the inning.We ended up in the same place, just took a different route to get there.

Jose Veras worked a wonderfully uneventful top of the 8th and the Bucs came up in the home half looking to add to their lead. Fort McKenry (thanks, Walkie) led off with his first career extra base hit and Matt Diaz trotted out to PH, looping a single to right. Jose Tabata was now at the plate with 1st and 3rd and no outs and smacked a line drive looking like a sure single up the middle. This was not the case, though, as the line drive struck the pitcher in his lower back and ricocheted to Hardy at SS, who nearly caught it out of the air. Hardy was able to pick up the ball and get the force of Diaz at second, but McKenry scored and we were inches away from one of the most bizarre triple plays in MLB history. Had Hardy caught the ball instead of knocking it down, Fort McKenry and Diaz were both well off their base and a triple play would have been on. Luckily, he couldn't snag it and the Bucs were still in business in the 8th.

Brandon Wood followed Tabata with a single and GI Jones sat on a pitch but couldn't get under it enough and flew out to deep RCF. Cutch walked for the 3rd time on the night, bringing up Walker with the bases loaded and 2 outs. I like to say there are 2 things Neil Walker does best: 1.) Drives in runs and 2.) grounds into double plays. Coming into this bases loaded at-bat, he had already driven a run home and hit into a GIDP  on the night, so with 2 outs he only had one choice. Neil Walker lashed a double to left and drove in 2 more runs. Bucs 9, O's 3. That is how it would end, with the Bucs moving to within one game of .500 heading into today's game.

Player of the Game: Neil Walker, 2 for 5 with 3 RBI, 49 on the season, 1st among 2B. Cutch also deserves mention for going 1 for 1 with a 2B and 3BB as well as a sacrifice. Birthday Boy Jones had 2 RBI as did Xavier Paul.

Head Scratcher of the Game: I guess J-Mac was struggling, but I am not a huge fan of Jake Taylor pulling him when he did. However, I am an accountant and a blogger and Clint Hurdle has managed in the World Series. Plus the Bucs got the W, so once again, how can I really question him?

Face Palm of the Night:  Hands down the Cedeno bases loaded bunt. Man alive. What the hell happened? I haven't read a post game write-up so I don't know who had  that bright idea, but that was the WTF Moment of The Year thus far. Feel free to disagree with me, but that was downright ridiculous.

The Bucs face the O's this afternoon, at 12:35 with KC taking the hill. Let's see if he can get over this home woes.