If the Toronto Blue Jays miss the playoffs, they can look back on their season series with the Tampa Bay Rays, owners of the second-worst record in the American League.
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The Blue Jays had occupied sole possession of first place in the AL East as recently as September 5 but are still two games back of Boston after the Red Sox beat the Baltimore Orioles 12-2 on Monday. Ramirez hit a three-run homer off Marcus Stroman, who suffered his eighth loss of the season despite facing a Rays lineup that ranks near the bottom of Major League Baseball in average against right-handers.
According to oddsmakers from online sports book Bovada.lv, the Blue Jays are -205 money line favorites versus the Rays, who have odds of +180 to pull off the upset in Toronto tonight. He was used only as a defensive replacement at third base in the ninth inning Monday in the Jays’ 3-2 win over the Tampa Bay Rays. With two outs and Jose Bautista on first after a walk, Russell Martin cranked a fat hanging slider into the second deck to cut the Rays lead to a solitary run.
The Red Sox still have a two-game lead on Toronto atop the A-L East after a 12-2 smashing of Baltimore.
“We’re in September and we’re at the point where we need to be getting wins, so it’s frustrating”, Stroman said. “We had a couple shots at it, but we couldn’t get that big one”.
Since hitting three home runs against the Minnesota Twins on August 28th, the Pensacola, Florida native has just seven hits and only one home run in 42 plate appearances. The right-hander is winless in five starts since a home victory over Houston on August 14.
“I mean, he was dominating, he really was”, Jays manager John Gibbons said of Liriano, who will get another start this weekend in California against the Los Angeles Angels. The first play that got the crowd on their feet came in the aforementioned fourth as Ezequiel Carrera was able to double up Kevin Kiermaier at first on a botched hit and run thanks to a short fly ball to right field.
“He threw the ball well”, Martin said.
Toronto is hoping the break will do Donaldson some good.
The victory gave the Rays (61-83) the season series over the Blue Jays (79-65) at 10-8 with the rubber match in the current three-game series to be played Wednesday afternoon.
The third baseman, as it turns out, has been suffering from a sore right hip that he aggravated on Sunday against Boston.
The Blue Jays left seven men on base, including a bases-loaded situation in the seventh that ended with an Edwin Encarnacion strikeout by Danny Farquhar. It also was the last time a Blue Jays player had hit a pinch-hit home run.
With runners on first and second in the fifth inning, Stroman threw a 93 mile-per-hour two-seam fastball to Alexei Ramirez that the Tampa Bay shortstop hit over the wall to give the Rays a 3-0 lead.
Tampa got a run back in the seventh with Souza Jr.’s 17th homer of the season – a solo shot to left-centre field off reliever Joe Biagini.
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“He’ll be the first to tell you he’s underachieved this year from his standards and he’s going to build off of what happened at the end of that game and he’s the type of guy that can be very emotional and he knows how to harness it”, Pillar said.
