Another Horrible Call Against The Rays

The Rays lost a game I believe could have ended differently, if it weren’t for another horrible call by the home plate umpire. The Rays were losing 0-3 by the sixth inning and was in the midst of their usual big inning to come back when Hank Blalock came in as a pinch hitter and hit a single to start off the inning.  John Jaso was the next to follow with a double in the gap to put two runners in scoring position, putting Carl Crawford at the plate. Now, here comes the bs call that altered the momentum of the Rays inning.

 Tommy Hanson, pretty much to this point, was dominating the Rays lineup threw an unexpected pass ball that went to the backstop. With Blalock on 3rd and making a slow motion run (he’s really, really slow) to the plate, he seems to have slid underneath the tag and would be the first score for the Rays. But not so fast. The umpire calls Blalock out, when it was easily apparent  he was safe.”I felt like I made an aggressive baserunning play to get our team back in the game,” Blalock said. “And scoring that run, I felt like, would have given us a lot of momentum there. And the replay showed I was safe.” All I have to say is RIDICULOUS call.

Im not going to blame us losing on that single call, but it was definitely a game changer. The Rays bats were not in tact with the superb pitching by Hanson and Wade Davis again did not have any command or dominance in any of his pitches. Davis is now 5-7 with a 4.94 ERA. I dont want to count Wade out as a viable 5th starter, but its becoming known that he has been struggling this season on getting batters out. His walk to strikeout ratio is not that good. Striking out 51 and walking 30.

The Braves would end up winning this game 6-2, as the Rays scored a few runs in the 9th to get on the board; with a run scoring single by Zobrist, and a  double by Navarro. The series ends tonight and lets hope Shields can shut them down to get the series victory.