Estrada threw seven no-hit innings, not giving up a hit over the first six, and teammate Edwin Encarnacion belted his 41st home run of the year, as the Blue Jays held off Seattle to move back into a tie atop the American League wild-card standings.
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Marco Estrada took a no-hitter into the seventh inning, Edwin Encarnacion hit his 41st home run and the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Mariners 3-2 on Monday night in the opener of a critical three-game series.
Toronto Blue Jays starting pitcher Marco Estrada throws against the Seattle Mariners in the fifth inning of a baseball game, Monday, Sept. 19, 2016, in Seattle.
Estrada (9-9) exited after starting the eighth inning with a four-pitch walk to Leonys Martin.
Estrada walked Robinson Cano and Nelson Cruz with two outs in the fourth inning. But the injury riddled Estrada tossed his most clutch performance of the season after having a disappointing 5.47 earned-run average through his most recent ten outings. Estrada was partly to blame for the September swoon. Ryan Goins is 3-for-7 with a homer versus Walker, who went 0-1 with a 5.40 ERA in two starts against Toronto in 2015.WALK-OFFS1.
The hometown feel gave the Blue Jays a lift Monday night, and now the AL wild-card leaders are hoping to build off that win and keep rewarding the visiting fans. Both teams are 2 ½ games clear of Detroit and three ahead of Seattle and Houston.
“We felt like we were the home team”, Estrada said, “and it was something we could build off of”. Estrada retired the next three Mariners but when he walked the leadoff man in the eighth, manager John Gibbons went to the bullpen for Jason Grilli.
The Blue Jays stole three bases, including two from Pillar after singles in the third and fourth innings. Closer Roberto Osuna entered and got Cano to line out to the warning track in right field where Ezequiel Carrera was playing. Martin hit a two-out, two-run homer in the ninth off Osuna, but Gamel struck out looking to cap Osuna’s 34th save.
“Not a lot of hits, but we had a rally late”, Seattle manager Scott Servais said. “I thought our guys gave a really good effort tonight, just wasn’t enough”.
Toronto got a a two-run homer from Edwin Encarnacion in the third inning against Mariners starter Taijuan Walker. The Jays added what turned out to be the decisive run in the fourth on a two-out RBI single by Kevin Pillar. Obviously if it would have happened it would have been incredible but it didn’t.
In the seventh inning, after Devon Travis had singled to lead off (extending his hit streak to 16 games in the process), Donaldson was ejected from the game after home plate ump Chris Conroy called him out on strikes.
Toronto third baseman Josh Donaldson was ejected in the seventh inning for arguing a third-strike call. Donaldson was already upset about a check-swing Conroy called a strike earlier in the at-bat and flipped at being called out on a fastball on the outside corner. J.A. Happ gets the ball, and he’s 19-4 with a 3.27 ERA and 152 strikeouts this season. The 33-year-old is attempting to join Boston’s Rick Porcello (21) as the only 20-game winners in the major leagues thus far this season. Happ is 2-1 with a 4.70 ERA and 14 strikeouts in his career against the Mariners.
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Walker (6-11) pitched a three-hit shutout against the Angels in his last start. The Mariners, who avoided being swept by Houston thanks to a 7-3 victory on Sunday, have won nine of 11 to close within two games of the fading Blue Jays for the second wild-card spot.Seattle took two of three at Toronto from July 22-24 and has gone 27-18 since August 2 to climb back into the chase for its first trip to the playoffs since 2001. The Blue Jays have allowed 12 runs in their last three games and four or more runs in eight of their last 14 games.
