Standing in the on-deck circle, Howie Kendrick watched Yasmani Grandal battle through an eight-pitch at bat for a tying sacrifice fly.
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The Blue Jays could only muster two hits off him and the only damage was a two-run homer by Jose Bautista in the sixth inning. Although Storen loaded the bases in the ninth inning, he escaped without giving up a run and earned the save.
The 28-year-old Kershaw matched his season-high with 10 strikeouts and allowed eight hits while improving to 4-1 on the season.
Storen allowed a walk and a double and both scored after closer Roberto Osuna replaced him. It is 0-5 in those contests. “He won’t say that, but that’s exactly what happened”.
“He can run late in the game and give up very few hits. Hopefully we can all turn things around and play as a group, play together, because this team is way too good not to”.
Barney has proven to be an early-season revelation for the Blue Jays, and is now being utilized in a second-base platoon with left-hand hitting Ryan Goins.
Right-hander Pedro Baez started the eighth for the Dodgers and allowed a one-out single to Michael Saunders. Smoak hit a one-out ground-rule double off Jansen but the right-hander got Tulowitzki on a lineout and Pillar on a strikeout to end it.
The Texas left-hander allowed 11 hits, 11 earned runs and walked three batters over 2 2/3 innings.
“I wasn’t really going to wait around to see his slider or anything like that”, Kendrick said. “My fastball command wasn’t as good as it has been so I was working from behind a lot today which made it tough”.
Manager Dave Roberts said Ryu will need to throw once more before beginning a minor league rehab assignment…. “A big hit for us”.
Seager added an RBI single in the top of the ninth.
Pillar doubled to left center to lead off the bottom of the third inning.
Pederson tied it with a two-out drive off Estrada in the seventh. “I made a bad pitch and he put a good swing on it. Just tip your hat and move on”.
Thompson led off the sixth with the Dodgers’ first hit, a double to right center. Eleven of his past 27 hits have gone for extra bases. After 30 games last season, Toronto had reached double-digit run totals on six occasions….Toronto will continue its seven-game homestand Friday night against the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Blue Jays: RHP R.A. Dickey (1-3, 5.73) is winless in his past five starts, going 0-3 with a 5.79 ERA in that span. Dickey is 1-1 with a 2.08 ERA in four career appearances against the Dodgers.
The Oakland Athletics and Baltimore Orioles split their doubleheader, the former winning 8-4 before losing 5-2, the Arizona Diamondbacks beat the Atlanta Braves 4-2 and the San Francisco Giants needed 13 innings to overcome the Colorado Rockies 2-1.
Shortly after Eovaldi retired Ortiz a second time, the Yankees scored six times in the next three innings and ultimately knocked out David Price (4-1). His opponent will be RHP Jake Peavy (1-3, 9.00 ERA).
But until Saturday afternoon Kershaw had never faced the Blue Jays.
Darwin Barney’s leadoff single in the third was Toronto’s only hit through the first five innings, but Yasiel Puig threw out Barney as he tried to stretch his hit into a double.
The Los Angeles TV broadcast team suggested Barney had said something in the direction of the Dodgers dugout; odd since Barney played 24 games with the Dodgers between 2014-2015 before joining the Blue Jays in a trade and, in fact, planned to meet up with some of his teammates after Saturday’s game.
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With Justin Smoak perched at second base, Pillar poked a single through the right side and the lumbering Smoak was signalled to hold up at third by Toronto third base coach Luis Rivera.
