A.L. Wild Card Race remains Tame – Bard Struggles

The Rays missed out on their opportunity to gain ground on the Red Sox last night in the wild card race, as Jeremy Guthrie out dueled Wade Davis to help the O’s down Tampa 6-2.

Wednesday evening, Tampa’s bats were silent, as outfielder Matt Joyce provided just about all of his teams’ offense, going 2-4 at the dish with two RBIs.  Reid Brignac was the only other Ray who could muster a hit.

Meanwhile, yesterday afternoon the Red Sox took a 4-2 lead into the eighth in their game against the Blue Jays.  The game was for all intensive purposes a slop-fest, as each team managed to commit three errors.  In the end, Boston failed to hold on to their lead.

The increasingly nasty problem the Red Sox are encountering, on top of their rotation that almost resembles a unit straight out of “Saving Private Ryan,” is the unraveling of their set-up man Daniel Bard.

From May 27th to July 31st, Boston’s 1st round pick in the 2006 draft was unstoppable.  Bard went 26.1 consecutive innings without allowing a run, and his opponents posted a .125/.181/.148 slash line against him.  Also during this stretch, the Red Sox coincidently went 21-4.

However, Daniel is struggling to find the dish as of late – he’s issued five free passes in his last three outings, and it’s helping Boston stay in the danger-zone so to speak.  Boston lost all three of these games, as Bard has earned the loss each time.

Last Wednesday in Toronto, Bard entered the game in the eighth frame trying to help Boston hold a 8-6 lead.  He beans Brett Lawrie, gives up a single to Adam Loewen, and then loads the bases by walking J.P Arencibia.  Instead of making Toronto put the ball in play, he walks Thames and Bautista allowing the Jays to knot things up at eight.  Then Edwin Encarnacion works a full count  forcing Bard to give in, and Toronto’s DH clears the bases with a double to right-center.  Ball-game.

On Saturday, Boston scratched out two runs in the ninth to force extra-innings in Tampa against the surging Rays.  Bard eventually entered in the 11th inning, and while he didn’t issue a walk, control was once again his demise.  After giving up a lead-off triple to Desmond Jennings, Bard misfired on a 0-2 offering to Evan Longoria, and the Rays’ leader promptly drilled the ball into center-field for a walk-off single.

Now back to yesterday’s contest – Bard entered in the eighth trying to protect a two-run lead.  He walks Encarnacion and Kelly Johnson on nine pitches.  Mark Teahen misses his first bunt attempt, ironically prompting a Bronx cheer from the Fenway crowd.  On the ensuing pitch Teahen barely gets a bunt down – Bard fields it and slings a cut-fastball to first that was basically uncatchable, and now the bases are juiced.
Adam Loewen ropes a single into center-field bringing home two Jays, and then Boston goes down in order in the eighth and ninth.  Ball-game.

Daniel Bard needs to right the ship.  This is really his first rough patch as a major-leaguer, and it is unfortunately coming at the worst time.  Boston has heavy artillery in their batting order, but if they can’t hand the ball to Papelbon with a lead, then it really doesn’t matter.

Don’t expect the Rays to go down without a fight, they are young, but do have meaningful fall baseball experience in their back pocket.  If Boston wants to make noise in the postseason, Francona and his staff need to help Daniel Bard figure things out.  Otherwise, a lot of national writers’ preseason World Series predictions will be incorrect.