It took longer than they’d have liked, but this Blue Jays win was an example of the whole being more than the sum of its parts.
This 11-inning, 3-2 walk-off win over the Detroit Tigers Friday night, with Aaron Hill delivering the crucial run-scoring single, was hardly the prettiest bit of work this team has done this year, but it had grit and resilience and a long list of contributors.
In a game in which the Tigers had multiple chances to put the Jays away, it was the Jays who took advantage of their few opportunities and bounced back from their mistakes.
After the Tigers had saved themselves from a nine-inning 2-1 loss when they got to Toronto closer Kevin Gregg for the tying run, John Buck started the winning rally with a one-out single. When Fred Lewis walked to put Buck in scoring position, John McDonald came in to run as Hill came to the plate.
Two pitches later, Hill lashed a single into right field, easily scoring McDonald.
“We needed that game,” said Hill.
“It was a good win for us. It was a combination of all the little things a lot of people did: Pitching, a couple of homers thrown in, grinding it out to the end; it was a whole team effort.”
Hill was trying to figure out who among his teammates had poked him in the face during the game-ending mob-scene.
“I have to do some video-replay to figure it out. But, I guess, it’s never a bad thing.”
Both starting pitchers, Shaun Marcum for Toronto and Justin Verlander, were long gone from this one before it was decided. Marcum pitched in and out of trouble for six innings.
“It was one of those nights,” said Marcum. “I got ahead of hitters but once I got ahead, I wasn’t able to put them away. But a lot of guys contributed. It was a collective, good team win.”
Verlander cruised through eight before departing. He gave up a pair of solo home runs, one to Jose Bautista and the other to Adam Lind.
Shawn Camp, Toronto’s sixth pitcher of the night, got the win.
“(Gregg) and Downs have been the anchors of our bullpen all year,” said Camp. “Kevin has been tremendous. What happened tonight is just baseball. Our team showed a lot of character and came out on top.”
In the early going, the Blue Jays were getting nothing done against Verlander, who held Toronto hitless through three innings.
But with one out in the fourth, Verlander fell behind 2-0 on the count to Bautista and tried to sneak a fastball by the major-league home run leader. The way Bautista is swinging these days, that, as the old saying goes, “is like trying to get the sunrise past a rooster.”
Bautista hit it over the left-field fence for his 42nd homer of the season to give Toronto, and Marcum, a 1-0 lead.
Through five innings, Marcum bent but didn’t break. He allowed two baserunners in every inning but the third and fourth but kept wriggling out of trouble. That changed in the sixth when Miguel Cabrera skimmed his 32nd homer of the year over the left-field wall and off the foul screen to tie the game.
Adam Lind put Toronto back in front 2-1 when he led off the seventh with his 18th homer.
That’s the way it stayed until the ninth when Gregg was summoned to protect that slender one-run lead. He got off to a horrid start when Austin Jackson crushed the first pitch Gregg delivered off the wall in dead centre for a triple. After Gregg struck out Ryan Raburn, Johnny Damon threaded a single between first and second base with the infield drawn in, to tie the score. It was Gregg’s fifth blown save in 34 opportunities.
Gregg eventually got out of the inning without further damage.
In the top of the 10th, working against Shawn Camp, the Tigers loaded the bases but, once again, the Jays stayed alive as Camp induced an inning-ending flyball from Damon.
In the bottom of the 10th, the Jays had a chance to end it with Yunel Escobar in scoring position but Vernon Wells struck out to end the threat.
