Sergi-Oh No! Jays Drop Home Opener

Everything was shaping up to be a great home opener for the Blue Jays.  The Rogers Centre was packed.  Henderson Alvarez made the start and went six strong innings, allowing only one run on four hits.  The Jays were terrific defensively throughout the game, highlighted by another stellar running/diving/sliding/holy @#*! catch from Colby Rasmus in the third.  Heck, Martin Short was on hand for goodness sakes.  How can you have a bad night with Martin Short in the house??

Colby hit a triple, then scored on a fielder's choice.  Escobar scores in the same inning.  Things were looking up!

The Jays took a 2-0 lead in the third and hang on to it until the sixth when Dustin Pedroia took Alvarez deep to get Boston on the board.  The Pedroia home run seemed inconsequential however.  That 2-1 lead held heading into the ninth inning with our closer, the hired gun we traded for coming in to take the ball.  Unfortunately, Sergio Santos's second opportunity to get his first save as a Blue Jay went even worse than the first opportunity did.

Pedroia struck again to start off the ninth.  Lacing a double into left field.  Then a passed ball allowed Pedroia to move to third, from which he was able to score on a sac fly from Adrian Gonzales.  Kevin Youkilis was next and Santos struck him out swinging for the second out.  At this point I thought we were heading to extra innings again.  The Red Sox however had other plans.  Santos walked the next two batter in David Ortiz and Cody Ross.  Darnell MacDonald was brought in to pinch run for Ortiz.  Then Sweeney drove in MacDonald and moved Ross to third and a wild pitch allowed Ross to score.

So effectively, Santos kind of gave this one away.  He never did get out of the inning either.  Luis Perez came in and immediately got Mike Aviles to ground out and end the inning.  The Jays went down 1-2-3 in the bottom half.

Sox win their first game of the season.  Jays drop to 2 and 2.

Positives to take away from this one:  Henderson Alvarez threw six quality innings of four hit ball.   The defense the entire game was great.  Colby Rasmus is still hustling, making plays and now appears to be starting to hit.  I'm getting concerned that I might start to like him... 

Negatives?  Sergio blows his second save (I'm not worried... yet...) and Escobar still can't seem to get good wood on the ball.  Not really worried about him at this point either. 

Tomorrow Kyle Drabek gets his first start of the season against converted reliever Daniel Bard.  I will try to find time to preview that one before first pitch.