When Romero finds himself at the Rogers Centre on Opening Day one week from now, he can look back on this outing as a big reason why. The 24 year-old lefty delivered seven solid innings by allowing just two runs on eight hits in the Jays 3-2 loss to Houston Sunday afternoon. He overcame a solo homer by Jason Michaels by recording 11 groundball outs and his K/BB mark was 6-0. Take that, Tulowitzki lovers!!! However, Jeremy Accardo's struggles continued as he allowed a solo homer to Lou "not F.P." Santangelo in the eighth to take the loss.
At the dish, the Jays had six doubles including run scoring two-baggers by Aaron Hill and Alex Rios and Marco Scutaro doubled down twice. Raul Chavez has had a nice spring with a batting average of .364 thanks to a two-hit afternoon. However, it's believed the former Pirate/Oriole/Astro/Mariner/Expo is going to Las Vegas as Michael Barrett is expected to win the back-up catching job.
Scott Richmond didn't exactly help his cause Saturday afternoon in a 5-1 loss to Detroit, in which he lasted just four innings. The defence didn't help him either with three errors, leading to two unearned runs on Richmond's line. Still, Richmond allowed a two-run homer by Placido Polanco. As for the positives, he got 6 groundball outs and struck out three while walking only one. The bright spot was the bullpen, who retired the last 15 batters in a row. "Wolverine" Brian Tallet had two shutout innings while Scott Downs, Jason Frasor and Shawn Camp finished up with a clean inning apiece. Offensively, the Jays had nine different players record hits including a base knock by the .386 hitting Travis Snider but left 10 men on base.
The defence wasn't exactly crisp over the weekend with five errors but they did behave for Roy "Doc" Halladay on Friday as they beat the Pirates 5-1. Halladay went seven strong innings while B.J. Ryan and Brian Wolfe finished up the eighth and ninth. Brad Emaus and Sean Shoffit each went deep for the good guys. Former Jay Eric Hinske wound up scoring the only run for the Bucs.
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On the injury front, Vernon Wells' wrist is acting up on him while Travis Snider and Rod Barajas are not 100 percent either. Meantime, Shaun Marcum is trying like heck to pitch again in 2009 while Dustin McGowan's status remains up in the air and Casey Janssen probably won't be back in action until May.
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Rosterwise, Russ Adams, Jason Lane, Brad Emaus, Scott Campbell and pitchers Dirk Hayhurst and Brian "CSI" Wolfe are among those heading to Las Vegas and elsewhere in the minor league chain.
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On the trade front, Curtis Thigpen was traded to Oakland for a guy known as PTBNL. I guess walk off homers in the spring don't count as much as they used to. His final regular season at-bat with Toronto was a memorable one when he hit his first major league home run in support of Scott Richmond's first major league win in Baltimore in the final weekend of the 2008 season. It was thought at first that Thigpen's homer wouldn't count because the Orioles did not go up to bat in the seventh inning of that rain-shortened game. He wound up throwing the souvenir baseball in the garbage but got it back when it was ruled the homer was official. All the best to Mr. Thigpen with Oakland, except against the Jays of course!
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This afternoon, it's a battle of the "P" lefties as David Purcey pitches against the GD Yankees Andy Pettitte. First pitch is set for 1:05 p.m. in Dunedin.
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In other TDIB notes..........
* Kevin Gregg has beat out Carlos Marmol as the Cubs closer.
* Brett Gardner and not Melky Cabrera will start as the Yankees centerfielder.