St. PETERSBURG, Fla. - The hit with the most impact in the Blue Jays 10-run sixth Tuesday night?
Aaron Hill's two-run homer, the Jays 200th on the season?
Vernon Wells' two-run double which gave the Jays the lead?
Cito Gaston's answer: The pitch from Tampa Bay starter Jeff Niemann which hit Jose Bautista.
"Our guys seemed to get fired up after Jose got hit, that turned things around," said Gaston after the Jays beat the first-place Rays 13-5, before 12,972 at Tropicana Field. "Sometimes you're better off letting people sleep.
"I'm not sure he was throwing at him intentionally or it got away. Whatever, it seemed to wake us up."
Trailing 3-1 in the sixth the Jays made it a one-run game with the tying run on second, when Bautista was plunked with a 1-0 pitch.
"Maybe they might hit me with a man on second and one out to set up a double play, not with no one out," Bautista said. "I was walking, but not to the mound. I was walking it off -- it hurt."
After that it was like Niemann lost what he had.
Wells hit his 39th double to score a pair, Adam Lind and John Buck each hit their 23rd double. Hill went deep to left off reliever Lance Cormier for the Jays 200th.
With two out and two on, Bautista came to the plate again and hit his 43rd of the season, four behind George Bell's club record. The three RBIs put him over the 100 mark.
"That was something I was shooting for, once I got off to a good start," said Bautista, who has now targeted a home run goal. "I can't control where the ball in the air. Man on third I can get a ground ball, I can control that."
Which he did in the eighth for his 104th RBI.
"I'm not surprised we hit this many," said hitting coach Dwayne Murphy when informed his team surpassed 200. "We thought we had five or six guys here who'd hit 20 each.
"Some people are down on Hill and Lind after what they did last year. But they've hit homers and their run production is there. Their averages are down mind you."
Bautista, who hit 10 homers the final seven weeks of 2009 after Alex Rios was claimed by the Chicago White Sox, hit the most dramatic homer of the season last week against the New York Yankees deserved to be in on the home run trot parade.
The Jays went into the game leading the majors by 26 homers more than the Boston Red Sox. Only the 1947 New York Giants, with Johnny Mize, Willard Marshall, Walker Cooper and Bobby Thomson led the majors in homers four of the first five months of the season, as the Jays have done.
The Rays led into the sixth before the air came out of the Teflon bubble as the Jays did a little of everything. Fred Lewis opened with a bunt which hugged the third base line as Rays catcher Kelly Shoppach yelled "sweep, hurry hard."
Lewis and DeWayne Wise stole bases. There were two homers, plus four doubles and three singles, a walk and a hit batter as the Jays sent 14 men to the plate tying a Rays record for most runs allowed in a single inning at the Trop.
John McDonald also homered off Niemann.
Ricky Romero breezed four innings, facing the minimum. After throwing first-pitch strikes to eight of the first 12 Rays hitters, including seven-of-nine, Romero missed on all five first pitches.
Ben Zobrist lined a ball up the middle which went through Hill's legs allowing the first run to score.
Hill was charged with an error but Dan Johnson's two-run double the scorer changed his decision and took the error away from Hill.
"When I saw it, I saw error, it cost him three earned runs," Gaston said.
