Toronto Blue Jays’ offence stymied by Yankees’ Tanaka before another sellout crowd

Talk about a reversal. The defeat dropped them 1 1/2 games back in the American League East.

Not so fast. All of a sudden, the Jays have slipped back to 1½ games out. I’ll be posting analysis, observations and general missives throughout the game.

Beltran opened Saturday’s game with a first-inning solo homer, giving Masahiro Tanaka a quick lead.

We had a good chance to tie it in the 9th.

“I was hanging in there, battling”, said Tanaka, who praised the pitch selection of catcher John Ryan Murphy.

Utley had four hits for the Phillies, who squandered a solid start by Adam Morgan (3-4) by stranding 10 runners. The most recent 10 game stretch for Toronto’s pitching staff has gone great.

Tanaka was brilliant in striking out eight and allowing just five hits in his longest outing of the season and his first complete game since June 28, 2014.

David Peralta drove in three runs and two hits, including a fourth-inning homer off Mike Foltynewicz (4-4).

The Yankees have two more games against the Blue Jays in this three-game series.

Tanaka (9-5) also carried with him the memory of last Sunday’s 2-0 loss to Toronto, completing the Jays’ three-game sweep in the Bronx and feeding their pennant-race momentum.

Carlos Beltran’s biggest 2nd as a Yankee was being muted with each pitch Andrew Miller threw within the ninth inning.

“Just an unbelievable job by Masahiro”, manager Joe Girardi said. “This is why he came here”.

Carlos Beltran, who wasted no time in putting the Yankees on the scoreboard with a homer at the top of the first inning, said that his team was focused on trying to maintain their lead. He was up to the challenge Saturday.

“As soon as I hit it, I knew it was going to leave the ballpark”, Beltran said.

In their last game, the Yankees won by a margin of one run. “I’m really satisfied I was able to do that”.

ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) – Josh Hamilton homered and delivered the tiebreaking sacrifice fly for Texas in a victory that snapped Tampa Bay’s four-game winning streak. Not Saturday.

It was the first go-ahead homer by a Yankees pinch-hitter in the eighth inning or later on the road since 1B Don Mattingly on July 24, 1994 against the Angels. This time it was a dead red changeup and Teixeira made no mistake, depositing the pitch into the second deck in right field.

With boos resounding through Rogers Centre in Toronto, Canada, every time the Yankees homered, fans were virtually on the edge of their seats to see if their beloved Blue Jays could rebound. They appear to have their swagger back this weekend.

“We hit a lot of home runs as a team, that’s the quickest way to score runs and we’ve been doing that all year, ” Teixeira said. “They went to our home and took three out of three. Right now we have the opportunity to do that”.

-RHP Michael Pineda (strained right forearm) had a 30-pitch bullpen session on Thursday and is scheduled to throw 45 pitches on a rehabilitation assignment with Double-A Trenton on Sunday.