After shaky start, Blue Jays turn on power to brush aside the Angels and claim top spot in division.
R.A. Dickey gives up five runs in first, but Blue Jays’ bats pick him up to complete sweep
ANAHEIM, CALIF.— Winning knuckleballer R.A. Dickey called the Blue Jays’ 12-5 victory on Sunday at Angels Stadium a family win, a community win, even his favourite win of the year.
That was an odd way to start his post-game briefing because, by and large, he had not pitched well. He was handed a one-run lead in the top of the first inning and then gave up five runs in the bottom as the Angels were shooting balls the opposite way, much as the Phillies had done in Dickey’s previous start.
“I gave up a five spot in the first, which I can’t ever remember a time in my big-league career where I’ve done that,” Dickey said.
“I was walking a tightrope of being pulled in my shortest outing ever as a big-leaguer. When I came in the dugout, everybody was still upbeat. There was no reason to pout.
“I look at things in terms of metaphor so much, it really felt like a family win. The guys are encouraging you and saying, ‘Hey, we’re going to get them back, don’t worry.’ They did.”
The first-place Jays, on consecutive days, showed that they can go to the post with two different running styles that can both lead to victory.
They can burst from the gate and go wire-to-wire as they did on Saturday, or they can stalk the lead, coming from well off the pace and closing teams out, blowing past an opponent when they looked like they were facing a loss, as Sunday’s game against the Angels looked in the early going
“We’re relaxed, we’re ready to hit when we’re in the box, we’re having good atbats and everybody is on the same page, swinging at strikes, laying off bad pitches and really executing well one through nine,” Jose Bautista said.
“Everybody is contributing and with a lineup so deep like this, if 7-8-9 are getting on base, whoever is on the other side is going to have trouble shutting us down. It’s fun, we hope to continue doing what we’re doing and the last month has been that type of attitude where we feel like we can’t lose any game.”
While the Jays’ usual suspect, Josh Donaldson failed to drive in a run, Bautista was on fire, slamming his 29th home run in the fourth inning, a 430-foot bomb to centre field that cleared some boulders and a few palm trees and then disappeared in the rockpile. Edwin Encarnacion followed with his 24th, a line drive just over the fence down the leftfield line. They both counted the same.
The fact that the Jays have come from well off the pace so many times this year, they show no fear in those situations, believing in the relentlessness of their offence to create enough runs to win.
“We scored 36 runs (in the series), so you have an offence that picked up the pitching,” Dickey said. “When you can do that — when you have guys picking up other guys, you have a team that is able to pitch well when an offence isn’t what they normally are, and an offence that picks up the pitching when the pitching isn’t normally what it is — it can make for a special season.”
Dickey gave up his five runs in the first on six hits, two sacrifice flies and a hit batter. The Angels squared up everything he lobbed in there, despite the return of his personal catcher, Josh Thole. But he made it through six innings and didn’t allow another run.
One of the turning points for Dickey was a smart play by Troy Tulowitzki that sucked the air out of the Angels dugout. David Murphy lined a ball off the wall in right centre field. Kevin Pillar’s throw was late, but Tulowitzki turned and held the tag on Murphy’s leg as he slid and popped up onto the base. In doing so he came off the bag with both feet for a fraction of a second. The shortstop waved for a challenge and the out was awarded. Dickey escaped in three more pitches.
Facing Garrett Richards, the Angels’ best pitcher thus far, the Jays scored two in the second on a wick- ed one-hopper that got past third baseman Kaleb Cowart off the bat of Tulowitzki.
And the offence was relentless, scoring in seven different innings. The 36 runs by the Jays against the Angels set a franchise record for a three-game series. The previous mark of 34 was set from June 30 to July 1, 2003 against the Red Sox.The Jays pounded out 48 hits, also a club record for a three-game series, and had nine different players credited with RBIs.
“With all the additions that (GM) Alex (Anthopoulos) was able to pull off and with the commitment from ownership, we don’t have that many weaknesses,” Bautista said. “If we just go out there and do our job and perform and nobody does anything outstanding, everybody does what they normally do, we usually get wins.”
The Jays, who are off Monday, will open a three-game set in Texas on Tuesday against yet another wildcard contending team.