Edwin Encarnacion hits a walk-off home run

Orioles 3 Blue Jays 4 (10th)

One at bat can change a player’s night. And, of course, make us all feel better.

Edwin Encarnacion was having a tough night, 0 for 4, 1 strikeout, left 3 runners on base. And then he came up in the bottom of the 10th. On the 7th pitch of the at bat, Edwin hit an opposite home run to win it for us.

Edwin had a couple of hard hit ball today, coming just short of an opposite field homer in the fifth inning. I keep thinking he’s close to going on one of those tears where he carries the team for 2 or 3 weeks, but it doesn’t happen. Maybe this is the start of one.

Before Edwin’s home run, that was damn near a carbon copy of yesterday’s game. We get out to a lead, and then let the O’s come back (this time they took the lead and we had to tie) and we go to extras.

The Jays got a run in each of the:

• The first: Ezequiel Carrera started us off with a bunt single. He went to third on a pickoff throw that went got past Orioles first baseman Chris Davis. Josh Donaldson followed with a nice opposite field line drive single, scoring Ezequiel. Josh stole second. That was Josh’s fourth steal of the season. But, in what would be a continuing story for the game, we couldn't get him home from second with no outs.
• The fourth: Michael Saunders led off the inning with a home run. Justin Smoak would follow with a walk and was moved to second on a Russell Martin bunt. And, of course, we couldn’t score him. I wasn’t thrilled with the bunt, following a home run and a four pitch walk, but Martin was trying to bunt for a single.
• The sixth: Smoak hit 1-out double and Martin singled him home.

We had 10 hits and 3 walks, so you would have expected more than 4 runs. Kevin Pillar and Darwin Barney had 2 hits each. Everyone else in the lineup had a hit, except for Devon Travis, who was 0 for 4, leaving 6 runners on base.

Marco Estrada looked great for 4 innings and then had to fight through the fifth and sixth innings, giving up a run in the fifth (a Jonathan Schoop home run) and 2 in the sixth (a Chris Davis 2-run shot).

In 6 innings, Estrada allowed 4 hits (2 of them home runs), 3 earned, 4 walks with 8 strikeouts. Not terrible,not great.

Our bullpen was great:

• Jesse Chavez threw 2 innings, allowing just 1 walk. He’s looked much better of late.
• Roberto Osuna pitched a clean ninth, with 2 strikeouts.
• Drew Storen pitched a clean tenth. That’s the guy I thought we were getting in the trade.

Jays of the Day: Edwin (.232 WPA), Chavez (.194), Martin (.198), Storen (.137) and Osuna (.137).

Suckage: Travis (-.229) and Estrada (-.099).

We had 860 comments in a fair subdued GameThread. Eric H led us to victory. Great job sir.