OAKLAND, Calif. — A week ago, the Toronto Blue Jays‘ season very much appeared to be on the brink, the losses of Bo Bichette and Matt Chapman to injury preceding a gutting 5-4 loss to the Washington Nationals that dropped the club 3.5 games back of the third wild card spot.
September baseball, however, can get crazy fast, and a fifth win in six games, 7-1 over the Oakland Athletics on Tuesday night, in combination with the ongoing Texas Rangers’ slide, put the Blue Jays back in possession of the American League’s final post-season berth.
At 77-62, the Blue Jays are now a half-game up on the 76-62 Rangers, who lost for the 13th time in 18 games, 14-1 to the AL West-leading Houston Astros (79-61). Toronto is also a half-game back of the Seattle Mariners (77-61) for the second wild-card spot, making for a jumbled mix of four teams fighting for three playoff spots.
By no means does this mean the Blue Jays are home free — they’re far from that.
But with one more game against the A’s before returning home to open a three-game set against the similarly woeful Kansas City Royals on Friday, the Blue Jays have a chance to build some padding before a pivotal clash against the Rangers in Toronto starting Monday opens a difficult three-week stretch to the finish line.
A six-run seventh keyed by Kevin Kiermaier’s RBI base hit that opened the scoring and a two-run single by George Springer that extended the advantage ensured that a terrific outing by Chris Bassitt, who allowed one run over eight masterful innings, didn’t go to waste.
The Blue Jays squandered opportunities in the second, third and sixth innings against A’s starter Ken Waldichuk before finally breaking through against the Oakland bullpen, when Zach Neal walked the bases loaded before Sam Long surrendered the damage.
After the Kiermaier and Springer singles made it 3-0, Davis Schneider added a run-scoring double, Whit Merrifield hit a sacrifice fly and Cavan Biggio, who opened the inning with a walk, took another base on balls that forced in a sixth run.
Springer added another RBI single in the eighth as the Blue Jays gave themselves a rare outing free of late-game leverage.
