BLUE JAYS HOPES HANG BY A THREAD
FOUR-RUN RALLY IN BOTTOM OF 7TH EARNS RED SOX A 5-3 WIN AND DIMS TORONTO’S PLAYOFF ODDS
This is Big Papi’s weekend, a threeday farewell festival that promises to have plenty of curtain calls in the coming days, maybe weeks of playoff baseball.
But first things first. First, before he puts the finishing touches on his shiny legend, he seems bound and determined to bury the Blue Jays flagging playoff hopes.
Friday night, David Ortiz capped a four- run Boston rally in the bottom of the seventh with his 38th homer, a two- run shot that held up for a 5- 3 victory in the opening game of this season-ending series.
The loss, coupled with victories by Baltimore and Detroit pushed the Blue Jays out of first place in the American League wild- card derby and precariously close to complete elimination from the playoff picture.
The Orioles now move into top spot in the wildcard standings. Toronto still clings to the second wildcard slot but the Tigers are only a half-game back with a game in hand.
The Jays had taken a tworun lead on the Sox with a three- run rally in the top of the fifth inning but Boston tied it against reliever Joe Biagini in the seventh. With Mookie Betts on first base, Ortiz came to the plate against lefty Brett Cecil, who tried to sneak a fastball past the Boston slugger and paid the price.
Neither starter, Rick Porcello or Marco Estrada figured in the decision but both pitched well. Estrada got into early pitch- count trouble but stuck around long enough to leave with a 3-1 lead after the fifth. Porcello lasted one inning longer, left the game trailing by two runs, but he got off the hook when his mates rallied late.
The Blue Jays entered September at 76- 57 with a two- game lead in the American League East. They leave the month behind with an 11-16 record, having all but squandered their playoff hopes completely.
They can still save them- selves but it will probably take wins here on both Saturday and Sunday to do it.
The Red Sox drove Estrada’s pitch count out of sight, even though they touched him for just one hit over the first two innings.
Estrada needed 51 pitches to get through those two innings. Of those 51 pitches, 18 were foul balls, many of them good pitches spoiled by the veteran Red Sox hitters.
In the first inning, Brock Holt walked with one out, t hen went t o second on a wild pitch. David Ortiz drove him in with a single, punctuating an eight- pitch at-bat that included five foul balls.
Just to prove you don’t have to see a ton of pitches to create a rally, the Jays rallied to take the lead in the top of the fifth in an inning where Porcello threw just nine pitches.
Devon Travis led off with a double, hitting Porcello’s second pitch of the inning. Ezequiel Carrera tried to sacrifice himself on the first pitch he saw but the ball got past Porcello for a single. Josh Donaldson hit a sacrifice fly to score Travis on the first pitch. Encarnacion flied out to right on the first pitch and then Jose Bautista lofted his 22nd home run of the year into the Green Monster seats in left on – you guessed it – the first pitch.
Russ Martin f i nished off the inning with a threepitch foul-out to the catcher.
For all his early inability to economize on pitches, Estrada still gutted out five solid innings. That lone first inning run he surrendered was the only blot on his record. The Red Sox had runners in scoring position in the third, fourth and fifth innings but could not push another run across.
With his 108th and final pitch of the evening, Estrada induced a line- drive bullet from Ortiz’s bat that Bautista tracked down in right field to leave the game with a two-run lead.
With Estrada out of the game, Joe Biagini got a quick out in the bottom of the sixth, then yielded a triple into the right field corner by Xander Bogaerts. With a runner 90 feet from home, Biagini bowed his neck and struck out first Jackie Bradley, Jr. , and then Sandy Leon to strand Bogaerts.
In t he bottom of t he seventh, Andrew Benintendi led off with a double into the right- centre gap. Pedroia’s swinging bunt bounced in f ront of t he plate. Martin fielded it but threw wide of first base, the ball becoming wedged under the tarp in right field.
Benintendi was awarded home plate and Pedroia went to second on the error. Biagini wild- pitched Pedroia to t hird and he strolled home with the tying run on Betts’s single into centre field.
That brought Brett Cecil out of the bullpen to face Ortiz with one out. Cecil fell behind 2- 0 before Ortiz looked at a fastball for strike one. The next pitch, another fastball, left the yard in a nano- second, just inside the pole in right to put the Red Sox up 5-3.
THE JAYS HAVE ALL BUT SQUANDERED THEIR PLAYOFF HOPES WITH AN 11-16 RECORD.