Danny Jansen hits a 3-run homer, Jays win

Blue Jays 5 Twins 2

It was one of those games that never seemed well in hand, but still stayed low in drama.

It wasn’t Alek Manoah’s best start of the season, he seemed to have runners on base all the time, but when he needed, he made the pitches.

He kind of fought his way through 5.2 innings inning, giving up 6 hits and 2 walks, but he had 8 strikeouts and induced 2 double plays. He gave up a Byron Buxton home run (if Buxton hit everyone else the way he’s hit us, and if he could stay healthy, he’d be an MVP candidate) in the fifth. And a walk hit batter (one of two Alek plunked), and RBI single in the second. It could have been worse, but Luis Arraez ground into a double play.

There were a few moments that could have turned out:

• The first inning went single, walk before there was an out.
• In the third, a double play helped out.
• There was a double in the fourth, a ball that Corey Dickerson misplayed at the wall. It seemed to be hit better than it was, I thought it was a home run, but came down on the right side of the wall, but Dickerson misplayed it.
• And a single (not really a single, Santiago Espinal, playing in left field in the four outfielder thing, lost the ball in the sun) and hit batter (Mitch Garver seemed to lean into it) in the sixth, which convinced Charlie that Tim Mayza should come in.

Mayza got the last out of the sixth and the first two outs of the seventh. Before Charlie decided to go righty-righty, bringing in Adam Cimber to face Buxton. I thought Mayza looked so good I’d have kept him in, but Cimber is good against RHB and Buxton has been a pest.

Cimber got the first two outs of the eighth, then gave up a single and a double. Neither was hit all that well, but with the tying run at the plate, I was happy to see Jordan Romano come in. He struck out Miguel Sano on three sliders.

Jordan pitched a quick ninth for his 21st save. He is looking very sharp, just when we need him to be.

On offense, we did enough:

• 3 runs in the second: Singles from Dickerson and Espinal, and a home run from Danny Jansen, number 9 for Danny.
• 1 run in the fifth: George Springer gets his second home run in two days, number 19. Good to see him hitting again.
• 1 in the eighth: Bo Bichette ‘doubled’, another ball lost in the sun, and Hernandez doubled.

We had 9 hits. I would have been ok with a couple more runs, but such is life.

Springer had 3 hits (cancel the funeral), Bo had 2. Vlad, Marcus, and Randal had 0 fors.

Jays of the Day: Jansen (.186 WPA, nothing makes me happier than Danny getting a JOD), Springer (.126), Mayza (.135), Manoah (.116) and Romano (.108).

Suckage: Marcus (-.096).

Tomorrow we have an off-day, I’m glad I have squash. Then Tuesday we start a three-game series against the Yankees in Toronto (with 30,000 fans allowed in). Not that any series in the last 3 weeks haven’t been, but this series is huge.

We had 367 comments in the GameThread. I led us to victory.