The Silver Lining Report: Game 18/162 (O's lose 4-2)

[interloper]

A pretty quiet affair, but we'll find a few nuggets.

• Dylan Bundy: If you want a silver lining about Dylan, it's that for the second start in a row it was his best start of the season. As Frobby noted in the Bundy thread, he was touching 93 in the 5th and did get 5 Ks. Just my gut feeling: I think he's lining up to pitch a gem pretty soon and hopefully get on a little bit of a roll. 
   
• Tanner Scott: I like how they're using him in <1 inning stints so far. Last night was a good one as both of his outs were Ks. 
   
• Mike Wright: 0 ER in his last 3 appearances. Got 4 outs in the middle of the game to keep it close and that's what you want from him. 
   
• Rio Ruiz: Big RISP hit up the middle off a very tough pitcher in Glasnow. The batting average doesn't look great for Rio, but it seems like he usually finds his way on base each game, or makes a good defensive play.
   
• Dwight Smith Jr.: You can't stop him. You can only hope to contain him. 2 more hits. One was an infield single that the replay confirmed he beat out. Stolen base number 3.
   
• Renato Nunez: Drove in the aforementioned Smith with a quirky RBI double that got by the Rays 3B. 
   
• Had the lead: Had the early 2-0 lead on the MLB-leading Rays and their stud pitcher, who came in with a 0.53 ERA. That's honestly pretty impressive with our lineup and further shows these guys can grind out some runs off tough pitching at times.
   
• Scorched some balls that didn't fall in: Whatcha gonna do. Particularly a couple from Villar.

 

 

[Moose Milligan]

This is one that got away, IMO.  

Sometimes they're doing a good job of working the count and seeing pitches.  The first inning was fantastic, they had Glasnow to 25 pitches and pretty much everything they hit was hard.  They had him on the ropes real early, just couldn't finish him off.  Overall, I like the approaches most of these guys have.

 

 

[milbest77]

At least we didn’t have a #1 seeded hockey team get swept out of round 1 of the playoffs...

[mdbdotcom]

We stayed in it all game.

[weams]

Link in game article.

[LTO's]

 The Rays had 4 Ks all game to our 9. We put a really high amount of balls in play and weren’t necessarily rewarded for it.  We weren’t very patient at the plate which seemed to be a strategy but we put some stings into balls that didn’t fall. I think Bundy could excel in the bullpen and DJ Stewart would be better than Joey Rickard.

[bobmc]

10 minutes ago, LTO's said:

 The Rays had 4 Ks all game to our 9. We put a really high amount of balls in play and weren’t necessarily rewarded for it.  We weren’t very patient at the plate which seemed to be a strategy but we put some stings into balls that didn’t fall. I think Bundy could excel in the bullpen and DJ Stewart would be better than Joey Rickard.

Thanks to @interloper for starting my day off with a positive in spite of the L!

This is becoming more and more "obvious" with SSS alert but Joey has more than a SSS on his resume.  So the "silver lining" would be Rickard showing that he is not a nugget or at best simply a platoon player.  As @Tony-OH mentioned on Twitter - having Rickard up in the ninth with 2 outs is not a good look.

Gary and BRob added to the entertainment factor on the MASN broadcast, which I am not permitted to view live, unfortunately.

[interloper]

10 minutes ago, LTO's said:

 The Rays had 4 Ks all game to our 9. We put a really high amount of balls in play and weren’t necessarily rewarded for it.  We weren’t very patient at the plate which seemed to be a strategy but we put some stings into balls that didn’t fall. I think Bundy could excel in the bullpen and DJ Stewart would be better than Joey Rickard.

Agree, but who's your backup CF on the roster then? 

[bobmc]

3 minutes ago, interloper said:

Agree, but who's your backup CF on the roster then? 

I guess we would be limited to Dwight Smith - not ideal but he's "just a backup".

[interloper]

Just now, bobmc said:

I guess we would be limited to Dwight Smith - not ideal but he's "just a backup".

I could live with that. 

[bobmc]

1 minute ago, interloper said:

I could live with that. 

Yeah and we have seen enough of Joey (not that he hasn't given his all and showed flashes of something).  He has an option and we need to see DJ.  Let's start auditioning the young guys while they are still considered "young".