Two days after a disastrous series ended, the Toronto Blue Jays are back in a playoff spot.
The Blue Jays overtook the Seattle Mariners for the third and final American League wild-card spot when Seattle lost 6-2 in 11 innings to the visiting Los Angeles Dodgers on Saturday.
The Blue Jays are now a half-game ahead of the Mariners and a half-game behind the Texas Rangers, who swept a four-game series in Toronto earlier this week.
The Blue Jays have won two in a row against the Boston Red Sox in the aftermath of the Texas series.
The Mariners and Rangers both own the tiebreaker on Toronto, meaning the Blue Jays will finish behind either club if they end up tied.
The Dodgers clinched the NL West title with the win over Seattle.
GUARDIANS 2, RANGERS 1
CLEVELAND (AP) — Steven Kwan drove in Canadian Bo Naylor following Tyler Freeman’s tying single with two outs in the eighth inning, rallying Cleveland Guardians to a victory over Texas.
The Rangers, who remain in the second AL wild-card position, dropped their second straight in the series. They stayed a half-game behind first-place Houston in the AL West when the Astros lost at lowly Kansas City.
“This is a tough one, no getting around it,” Texas manager Bruce Bochy said. “It’s a shame. We just couldn’t get much going offensively. I wish I could explain it. If I could, I’d fix it.”
Ramon Laureano doubled and Naylor walked against Will Smith (2-6) with one out in the eighth, then came around on singles by Freeman and Kwan off Jose Leclerc. Cleveland had stranded 10 baserunners through the first seven innings, including seven in the first three against Dane Dunning.
Reynaldo Lopez (3-7) pitched a 1-2-3 eighth for the Guardians, and Emmanuel Clase worked the ninth for his major league-best 41st save. Clase spent his rookie season with the Rangers before being traded to Cleveland in 2020.
“I get a little anxious every time I face them,” Clase said. “The real focus comes down to just pitching the same way when I come in all season. That’s what I tried to do.”
Texas took a 1-0 lead in the fifth when Marcus Semien doubled home Evan Carter for his 89th RBI of the season. Carter was the only Rangers player to advance past second base.
Dunning threw five scoreless innings despite giving up six hits, three walks and a hit batter. The right-hander struck out five.
“I couldn’t get myself a clean inning. I guess I wanted to pitched with some traffic,” he joked. “My command was a little spotty, but I was able to work my way out of trouble.”
ROYALS 10, ASTROS 8
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Kyle Isbel’s bunt single highlighted a three-run seventh as Kansas City beat Houston.
Reliever Hector Neris (6-3) flipped head over heels trying to glove Isbel’s squeeze bunt RBI hit in the seventh inning. Breaking a 6-all tie, the Royals added two more runs, aided by third baseman Alex Bregman’s throwing error.
“The bunt was a huge play,” Royals manager Matt Quatraro said. “Our speed came into play in that inning. We did some things there, putting the ball in play and using our speed.”
“I thought that was a huge momentum swing,” Isbel said. “(Quatraro) gave me the sign and it was my job to get it done.”
With the Rangers losing at Cleveland, Houston maintained a half-game lead in the American League West Division despite the loss.
“We’ve got a small lead in the division but we need to play better baseball,” Bregman said. “It starts with me. I need to make that play today. We need to execute better.”
“The leadoff walks really hurt us,” Astros manager Dusty Baker said. “And with a team that has speed and runs as much as they do, when you walk them, you’re asking for trouble. We had some real big hits, but it was the leadoff walks and a couple of errors, and we opened the gates for them, and they walked through.”
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