Belt Drives in Four, Jays Beat Yankees

Jays 6 Yankees 1

My favourite things are the Jays winning and the Yankees losing, so I’m very happy tonight.

Brandon Belt hit a two-run homer (in the sixth) and had a two-run double (in the eighth). The double was just short of a home run, and Aaron Judge made a leaping try at it, but it went off his glove. Belt, if you are only going to get hits against one team, I’d be happy if it were the Yankees. But.....get hits against other teams.

Vladimir Guererro drove in the other two runs with a first-inning home run (after George Springer opened up the game with a double).

We had 8 hits. Vlad and Brandon had two hits each. Vlad was also hit by a pitch in the ninth, and he was less than pleased. He stared at pitcher Greg Weissert after, and then Yankees’ first baseman Anthony Rizzo decided he should get into it with Vlad.

Vlad also made headlines by saying, once again, that he would never play for the Yankees.

And Yusei Kikuchi pitched a terrific game allowing just 4 hits, 1 run (on a Yankees’ Stadium special home run by Oswaldo Cabrera), 2 walks and 3 strikeouts. He brought his ERA down to 3.80. In four starts, he’s had three very good ones and one that wasn’t good. I’ll take that ratio. He is 3-0 now.

Erik Swanson, Trevor Richards and Yimi Garcia each pitched a scoreless inning of relief.

Jays of the Day: Kikuchi (.242 WPA), Belt (.226) and Vlad (.129).

No one gets The Other Award. Despite a hit and a walk, Bo had the low mark at -.076. He also made some nice plays with the glove.

Tomorrow is game two of the series in the Bronx. Alek Manoah goes up against Gerrit Cole (who is due a poor start). It is a 1:00 Eastern start.

I’m still not a fan of Apple TV games, but they had a couple of neat camera angles, including a camera on the plate umpire’s mask. That was interesting.