Strong Pitching Gives Blue Jays a Win, Sending the A.L.C.S. Back to Kansas City
TORONTO — Marco Estrada came up with a superb start in the most important outing of his career, stopping the Royals’ hit parade and helping the Toronto Blue Jays send the American League Championship Series back to Kansas City.
Estrada pitched one-hit ball into the eighth inning, giving Toronto’s tattered bullpen a rest, and the Blue Jays beat the Royals, 7-1, on Wednesday to close the gap in the series to three games to two.
“It’s the start that we needed,” Troy Tulowitzki said. “They’re a great team over there. We know that. But this guy kept them off balance and allowed the offense to settle in and get some runs.”
Tulowitzki provided three of those runs. He broke the game open with a bases-clearing double against Kelvin Herrera in the sixth, giving him seven R.B.I. in the series. Edwin Encarnacion had walked with the bases loaded against Edinson Volquez, who seemed flustered by close calls against the Royals.Kansas City had 30 hits in the first two games in Toronto, but Estrada faced the minimum number of batters, 20, before Lorenzo Cain walked with two outs in the seventh. Roberto Osuna was perfect in the ninth.
Yordano Ventura will start for the Royals, the defending A.L. champions, on Friday in Game 6 against David Price, who lost Game 2.
Estrada, a 32-year-old who will be a free agent in the off-season, enabled his bullpen to rest, a day after Kansas City romped, 14-2, in a game that saw infielder Cliff Pennington pitch in the ninth.
“This time around, I had a better fastball command,” said Estrada, who gave up three runs in the opener. “That was the key to this game.”
Toronto is trying to become just the 13th team to rally and win among the 80 who have trailed three games to one in best-of-seven postseason series. It has happened four times out of 17 in league championship series, including when the Royals bounced back against the Blue Jays in 1985 on their way to their only World Series title. In this year’s best-of-five division series, Toronto fell behind two games to none, then won three straight against Texas.
Before 49,325 roaring fans, Chris Colabello hit a solo home run in the second inning into the left-field seats to give Estrada a lead. It was the only mistake by Volquez, who won Game 1.
Estrada did not make a miscue until Salvador Perez homered with two outs in the eighth. Estrada retired his first nine batters and in the process ended Escobar’s record streak of leading off playoff games with a hit at four games.
Escobar, who entered 9 for 15 (.600), got Kansas City’s first hit when he opened the fourth with a ground-ball single past a diving Tulowitzki at shortstop.
Zobrist promptly grounded into a double play to second baseman Ryan Goins.
“He was really good today,” Escobar said. “He threw the ball down, down and away, down and in. He didn’t miss many pitches today.”
Kansas City had no other runners until Cain walked with two outs in the seventh. Price was up in the bullpen, but Estrada got Eric Hosmer to fly out.
Volquez allowed just two singles after Colabello connected, but lost the strike zone in the sixth.
Ben Revere led off with a walk, and Volquez hit Josh Donaldson with the first pitch. In August, Volquez hit Donaldson in a testy game that included a benches-clearing scrum.
He then walked Jose Bautista in a 10-pitch at-bat on a knuckle curve that looked as though it caught a piece of the plate.
“I thought the pitch to Bautista was definitely a strike,” Royals Manager Ned Yost said.
Yost shouted from the dugout for Perez to appeal to first base on ball four, thinking Bautista may have swung. But it was too loud in the closed-roof stadium for Perez to hear.
“We were trying to get their attention to get him to appeal it,” Yost said. “I don’t know if he was arguing the pitch. I don’t know what he was talking about.”
Encarnacion walked on another pitch that upset Volquez and Yost. Volquez turned his back to the plate umpire Dan Iassogna as Revere jogged home for a 2-0 lead. It was his last batter.
Herrera relieved and struck out Colabello. With the crowd chanting “Tu-lo! Tu-lo!” Tulowitzki sent a drive to the center-field wall, sending fans into a towel-waving frenzy.
Bautista and Donaldson had consecutive doubles against Danny Duffy in the seventh to make the score 6-0, and Kevin Pillar doubled in a run in the eighth.
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