As I sat and endured the agony of this game at The Trop I could not believe how absolutely lifeless the Rays were. How can they play so fired up Tuesday and come out with such little effort on Wednesday?! I was amazed as I sat and watched Ray after Ray stride to the plate and swing at the very first pitch they saw from Yankee starter Joba Freaking Chamberlain and hit a little blooper for an out. Joba Freaking Chamberlain people! Are you kidding me?! An opportunity to gain ground on the Yankees, and Boston as they also lost, and the Rays seemed totally uninterested. Was playing in October last year too much for these guys?! They are certainly acting like it was.
I understand that the Rays may have had a game plan to come out and jump on him early. BUT when they saw that wasn’t working there was no adjustment made. They should have changed the strategy and made him throw more pitches. In the 8 complete innings thrown by Chamberlain the Rays only saw 101 pitches – an average of a little more than 12 an inning. That’s ridiculous!
Another nice performance from our RH power bat Pat Burrell was also a highlight – 0 for 4 with 3 K’s. Nice job Pat! Not to mention we have a .215 hitter (Pena) and a .219 hitter (Burrell) batting back to back in the lineup. Joe – do you really think these guys are scaring anyone? Protecting anyone? Break this up! You can start by benching Burrell! Asked at the post game press conference about Burrell, Joe Maddon made it quite clear that he doesn’t care about fan or media reaction to this guy; they are going to keep working with him. He still believes he’s going to put up huge numbers the last 2 months of the season and carry this team. Really?! This guy isn’t even going to hit 15 HR or collect 60 RBIs by the end of the season! This experiment needs to end!
As the RFO clearly isn’t going to make any moves by the trade deadline we are stuck with some of the dead wood we have. To make the best of it this lineup needs to be juggled a bit and these guys need to start to be held accountable for their lack of performance. I am so tired of the excuses!
Look Rays – the season is getting short and you have a mountain to climb. I know the manager doesn’t see the urgency and it is being reflected in your play. If the coaching staff doesn’t have the urgency a leader needs to step up and have a closed door, player only meeting and find the urgency, the fire. Without that you guys are done. It is too late in the season to play like you’re just going through he motions.
This next 4 game series against Kansas City is a 3 out of 4 MUST. The Rays should sweep this team. The Red Sox are mired in a bit of a slump since the All Star break and they are facing the Orioles, a team they could find their stroke against. The Rays cannot afford to drop games against the bottom dwelling Royals.
I guess we’ll just have to keep blowing off our steam on blogs and hope someone on the team takes a leadership role. Let’s find the fire Rays!
