Blue Jays get stung by the Rays in 12-2 game.

In a mirror image of last night’s game, the Toronto Blue Jays found themselves on the wrong end of a lopsided score tonight with the Tampa Bay Rays outhitting them 17 to 5 in a 12-2 loss.   Tampa only hit one home run; which came in the ninth, and all other runs were scored by small ball.

The game started out promising with the Blue Jays pulling ahead 2-1 on a Jose Bautista two-run homer in the bottom of the first inning.  Unfortunately, that was the last time the Jays would cash in a run.  Jose had a good game overall going 1 for 2 with a walk, a homerun, and two RBIs.

Marcus Stroman broke his consecutive unbeaten streak of 16 games when he recorded the loss tonight.  He only walked two, and got two strikeouts; however, the Rays batters were seeing the ball exceptionally well.  The ball also seemed to find holes in the Jays’ defence every time they swung the bat.

Pat Venditte returned to the ball club today and was tossed straight into the action in the sixth in relief of Stroman.  The lefty/righty pitcher pitched 2.1 solid innings of relief.  The three runs he was charged with came in the seventh inning when Donaldson was charged with his 2nd and 3rd errors of the season.  Drew Storen entered the game in the ninth and threw seven straight balls to start the inning, and then gave up a home run to rookie Taylor Motter. This was Motter’s first major league home run.

Chris Archer  had a rough first inning, and walked four batters in the game; however none of that would matter in the end as his bats picked him up and he ended up with only two earned runs on four hits and seven strikeouts.

Tampa Bay had five doubles, one triple, and one home run.  Brad Miller was a home run short of hitting for the cycle as he walked, singled, doubled and tripled in the game.  Taylor Motter, who did hit the only home run of the game, was pinch-hitting for Brad Miller.

Jimmy Paredes entered the game in the bottom of the eighth to pinch hit for Bautista.  He singled his first at-bat as a Toronto Blue Jay and it will no doubt be a memorable single for Paredes .  The new Jay fired the ball right back at relief pitcher Ryan Webb and caught him square in the jaw.  Webb stayed in the game and did not seem to be injured despite the power of the line drive.

Next up the Jays try to avoid the sweep as R.A. Dickey 2-4 (4.31 ERA) takes on Jake Odorizzi 0-2 (3.83 ERA) Wednesday, May 17th at 7:07.