Blue Jays Lock Up First Division Title Since 1993

They wrapped up the division and forced the Orioles to watch them celebrate on their home field.

Ryan Goins may be shedding his “all-glove, no-bat” tag as he continues to raise his batting average.

The Blue Jays open the AL Division Series at home on October 8.

Fans across the country are over the moon and hoping the Jays are on their way to a third World Series.

Now that the Jays have secured the American League East title over the New York Yankees, it’s time to start sending nasty thoughts in the direction of the Kansas City Royals. At the outset, there was only a smattering of fans, mostly because of the dismal weather, the switch of the starting time and the Orioles’ late-season fade.

Two months of spectacular baseball culminated in a 15-2 rout of the Baltimore Orioles on Wednesday afternoon, ending decades of frustration for fans and rewarding the Blue Jays’ organization for a remarkable turnaround.

Winning the division seemed inevitable in recent days as the Yankees struggled and the Blue Jays kept rolling. He has allowed five runs in 27 innings overall, only giving up a solo homer to Baltimore left fielder Steve Pearce in the seventh inning on Wednesday.

Playing for the first time since being officially eliminated from playoff contention, the Baltimore Orioles offered little resistance against a Toronto team poised to inherit their AL East title.

A year ago, the Orioles earned their first division title since 1997. On this day, in the first game of a doubleheader, Toronto ended a longer drought before staging a hearty celebration on the Camden Yards infield.

“I felt like we were just waiting, like all of us were just waiting, the pitching staff was just waiting and when they kind of put the chips all in, it did something to us, and we took off”, Dickey said.

Baltimore aided the cause. If somebody’s going to beat us, they’re going to have to play tremendously well.

“That’s a convenient excuse”, Showalter said.

“It’s frustrating, because we had a lot of opportunities, and we fought back to get back in the game”, manager Joe Girardi said Wednesday night.

In the first game, Gerrit Cole pitched seven solid innings and Francisco Cervelli hit a grand slam off a shaky Michael Wacha for Pittsburgh.

Davis took over the home run lead at 45 in the nightcap, and Manny Machado and Matt Wieters also went deep.

Kevin Gausman (4-7) had a career-high 10 strikeouts over eight innings. Their September 30 loss was one of their most poorly played games of the season.

So much so, in fact, that Kawasaki openly admitted in a TV interview that, yes, he was drunk.

Cecil began the season as the team’s closer, and while he wasn’t great (five saves, two blown saves, 5.40 ERA) he also lacked the opportunities as the feast-or-famine Jays either won big or lost close.

The Cardinals’ Adam Wainwright (Achilles) returned from a five-month stay on the DL and gave up one run in the eighth, his first appearance out of the bullpen since 2006.

Even this year threatened more of the same. The last 22 years have been a string of frustrating seasons, particularly in the last few.