5 key moments Brendan Kennedy on how Jays staved off elimination,
Twists and turning points
Sanchez delivers Looking far more like himself than he did in his over-amped performance in Game 3 of the division series against Texas, Aaron Sanchez set the tone for his outing with a clean first inning. Touching 97 m.p.h. with his sinking fastball and throwing curveballs for strikes, Sanchez struck out the first two batters — fooling Carlos Santana with a sinker and getting Jason Kipnis to chase a curveball — before inducing a weak groundout from Francisco Lindor. Sanchez’s early dominance seemed to have a calming effect — not only for him, but the rest of the team — as he went on to hold Cleveland to just one run on two hits and two walks over six innings, while earning nine groundouts.
Donaldson connects Heading into Tuesday’s game Josh Donaldson had 13 hits, tops in the league. But the Bringer of Rain had yet to homer. That was until the third inning, when he barrelled up Corey Kluber’s slider and sent it just beyond the wall in left-centre to give the Jays their first lead of the series, the first run off Kluber in the playoffs. The fact Donaldson hit Kluber’s breaking ball is key as well, because Cleveland’s pitching staff has been hammering the Jays with curves and sliders, successfully exploiting what has been a season-long weakness. Donaldson also saved a run with his glove in the fifth inning by making a spectacular diving play on a sharp grounder.
Martin’s big BB In contrast to Donaldson, Russell Martin has been brutal since the end of the regular season. He was hitting .074 with 13 strikeouts in seven playoff games heading into Game 4 and even when you include all of September he has been hitting .140. Martin admitted after Game 3’s loss that he has not been having good at-bats — he was chasing bad pitches and needed to be more disciplined. That’s just what he did against Kluber in the fourth, when he worked an eightpitch walk to set up the eventual winning run. Two batters later, Ezequiel Carrera dunked a single into shallow centre field, scoring Troy Tulowitzki — who also walked — from second base.
Cecil’s seventh Much has been made this series about the dominance of Cleveland’s bullpen, but the Jays’ relief corps has also done its part, albeit in fewer and lower-leverage innings. The Jays’ bullpen has yet to allow a single run in the series, extending their scoreless streak to 9 2⁄ innings 3 on Tuesday. The biggest performance was by lefty Brett Cecil, who threw a perfect seventh inning against three right-handed hitters, which have been his Achilles heel this season. Leaning heavily on his curveball — which when it’s sharp, as it was on Tuesday, is one of the best of its kind — Cecil induced a fly out and two key strikeouts. Jason Grilli and Roberto Osuna followed with two scoreless innings of their own to secure the win.
Encarnacion breaks out Rarely do teams intentionally walk the batter ahead of the league leader in RBI, but that’s exactly what Cleveland did in the seventh inning, loading the bases for Edwin Encarnacion with none out in order to set up a force at every base. But with the sold-out Rogers Centre crowd roaring his name, Encarnacion, who had yet to drive in a run in the series, bounced a single off the mound and into centre field to score a pair of important insurance runs. Encarnacion’s hit, which all but guaranteed the Jays would live to see another day, seemed to press a release valve on the tension that had been building under the closed dome, letting fans exhale for the first time in the series.