Blue Jays 4, Yankees 3, and the story of Saturday afternoon was a right-hander in the wrong uniform who nearly threw a no-hitter at the Stadium. Dylan Cease took a no-no into the seventh before Jazz Chisholm Jr. broke it up with a two-out single, and by the time the Yankees actually threatened again, it was the ninth inning and Toronto's closer was already out there trying to finish the job.
He did. Trent Grisham struck out swinging to end it, Chisholm frozen at second with the tying run and nowhere left to go. The loss snapped a five-game winning streak and left the Yankees 3.5 games back of Tampa Bay in the AL East. It also evened this series at a game apiece after Friday's 3-1 win, setting up the rubber game Sunday.
Turning Point
The biggest swing of the day came with two outs to go, not two outs left. Chisholm led off the bottom of the ninth with a sharp double to center off Louis Varland, and for a second the offense that had done nothing for eight innings looked like it might actually finish this. Then Austin Wells struck out (an out that got run through the replay booth before it stood, which changed nothing except the pace of the ninth inning). José Caballero grounded out to third. Grisham swung through strike three, and Chisholm never moved past second.
Star of the Game
Credit where it's due, even when it hurts to write it: Dylan Cease was the best player on the field. Six and two-thirds innings, two hits, one earned run, eight strikeouts, and a no-hitter that only died because Chisholm poked a two-out single through the middle in the seventh. Cease walked five Yankees and got away with every single one of them (that part should sting worse than it will by Monday). He handed the ball over with a lead Toronto never gave back.
Key At-Bats and Pitching Lines
Ryan Weathers didn't have it. Three and a third innings, eight hits, two runs, and he was back in the dugout before the fourth inning finished (Toronto's first two runs both came on RBI singles, off George Springer in the first and Charles McAdoo in the fourth, and nobody in that lineup looked the least bit uncomfortable doing it). Yerry De los Santos relieved him and gave up a third straight-inning RBI single, this one to Lukes in the fifth, before settling in. Bradley Hanner took over from there, and Hanner's only real mistake was a leadoff pitch that Nathan Lukes turned into his eighth home run of the year in the top of the eighth, making it 4-1.
The answer came fast, for once. Austin Wells singled home George Lombard Jr. in the seventh, the hit right behind Chisholm's single that ended Cease's no-hit bid. One half-inning later, Luis García Jr. answered Lukes' blast with a two-run homer off Tyler Rogers, his 26th of the season, scoring Ben Rice and cutting the deficit to one. For a few minutes, the Stadium believed it again.
The Ninth Inning Math
Toronto's Louis Varland didn't get rattled by the leadoff double. He struck out two of the three batters he faced to close it out, the 29th save of his season, and made it look almost routine even after Chisholm's double put the tying run 90 feet closer than it had been all day. On the other side, there wasn't much to second-guess. The bullpen kept the deficit at one manageable run for most of the afternoon. The offense just came up a hit short of doing anything with it.
The Yankees have Sunday to even this series before Toronto leaves town. One more clutch swing gets it done.
Jimmy writes the Bronx Pinstripes game recap after every Yankees game. Beat-reporter pacing, fan's heartbeat. He calls opposing players by last name and has no patience for dead-air innings.
