After erupting for four homers among 15 hits in the opener, the Blue Jays look to add to the Twins’ troubles on Saturday afternoon as the clubs continue their three-game series at Rogers Centre.Russell Martin went deep and drove in five in Toronto’s 15-8 win on Friday to continue his stellar run over the last two weeks during which he is 18-for-44 with seven homers and 19 RBIs since August 13. The Twins jumped ahead 5-0 after the top half of the fourth and the Jays chipped away, scoring a run in the bottom of the fourth, two in the sixth, three in the seventh and two in the eighth courtesy of Upton’s heroics.
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Roberto Osuna pitched a ideal ninth with two strikeouts to earn his 29th save of the season.
With one out in the eighth and the Jays trailing 7-6, Upton launched a Ryan Pressly offering to right that Kepler failed to field cleanly.
Upton’s hit bounced past Twins right-fielder Max Kepler, bringing Blue Jays fans to their feet as Pillar scored. The 33 year-old has 15 homers on the year along with 59 RBI’s.
Twins starter Ervin Santana allowed five hits, five walks and six runs while striking out four in six innings.
Jays starter Marcus Stroman could be excused for his frustration, bordering on shoulder-shrugging resignation, in what looked like a key fourth inning. He struck out five.
Enough has been said about the struggles of the Minnesota Twins as they need to regroup for next season. Dozier led off with a single, stole second, took third on Joe Mauer’s fly out to left and scored on a wild pitch.
It is four wins in a row for the New York Yankees, who put the Baltimore Orioles to the sword with a 13-5 win, the Boston Red Sox halted the Kansas City Royals’ good run of form with an 8-3 triumph while Kelly Johnson whacked a pinch-hit grand slam in the New York Mets’ 12-1 demolition of the Philadelphia Phillies. Plouffe also singled, finishing the afternoon 2-for-3 plus a walk. Encarnacion followed with a grinding at-bat, bouncing a singled to left field for RBI No. 105, six shy of his career high, and narrowing the lead to 7-6.
Liriano only gave up a pair of hits through his five-inning ordeal, but issued four walks, three of which came around to score, making things close for a little while before the Jays broke it wide open in the sixth and seventh innings.
Toronto’s team earned-run average during the seventh inning or later is a boosted 4.18 compared to their overall ERA of 3.79 this season. The Blue Jays are 6-18 in such games this season.
“I kind of knew it would be a triple once it got by him”, Upton Jr. said, “but rounding second I saw (third base coach Luis Perez) kept waving me and I kept going”. He missed four games after receiving a cortisone injection in the finger on Tuesday.
Smoak, Martin, Josh Donaldson and Darwin Barney homered for the Blue Jays. Toronto OF Michael Saunders (tight hamstring) started in right field after missing two games after he tweaked his hamstring Wednesday.RF Jose Bautista started as the designated hitter.
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Twins: RHP Kyle Gibson (5-8, 5.09) is 1-1 with a 4.42 ERA in three career starts against Toronto.
