Royals don’t expect to resume August hostilities with Blue Jays

Sly James said he will wager a selection of ribs and barbecue sauce from three Kansas City restaurants on the outcome of the series and is now waiting for Tory to offer something in return.

The series matches the American League’s top teams, with the Royals (95-67) and Jays (93-69) finishing 1-2 in the standings. The benches cleared during a testy series that included pitchers throwing at hitters….

Although there might be a tendency to have a heated rival within the division (like the Orioles or Yankees), the Blue Jays biggest rival this season has arguably been the Kansas City Royals.

Alcides Escobar hit an RBI double and Lorenzo Cain a run-scoring single to give Kansas City a 2-0 lead over the Toronto Blue Jays after three innings in Game 1. He’s Kansas City’s starting pitcher out of the chute.

Scott Moore, president of Sportsnet and National Hockey League Properties for Rogers, tweeted that more than nine million Canadians watched Wednesday night’s thrilling nail-biter that ended with a 6-3 Jays victory and elimination for the Rangers. After facing left-handers in four of their five games against Texas, the Blue Jays are likely to face mostly right-handers against the Royals. Bautista’s shot against the Rangers was proof, but so were the major league league-leading 232 homers that Toronto hit during the regular season.

Bautista hit the biggest home run of his life, in the biggest game of his career and he enjoyed it. It’s easy to forget, but baseball is a sport, a game, even at the professional level.

“You look at all professional sports in general, everybody celebrates more so than they used to”, Blue Jays manager John Gibbons said.

Blue Jays: Toronto (93-69) was 50-51 after losing to lowly Philadelphia on July 28, the same day GM Alex Anthopoulos acquired Tulowitzki and Hawkins from the Rockies. Toronto scored four runs in the bottom of the inning and went on to win 6-3. Toronto finished with a 3.81 team ERA, good for fifth-best in the AL…. “We’ll see how it goes”. It was the third home run of the post-season for the star catcher. Cain was fourth in the AL in wins above replacement (WAR) behind the Angels’ Mike Trout, Donaldson, and the Rays’ Kevin Kiermaier….

Royals manager Ned Yost was one word more succinct: “Absolutely”.

– Bad Blood. Tempers boiled over in the final regular-season meeting between the teams, a 5-2 home win for Toronto on August. 2.

He dug himself a hole in the sixth by opening with back-to-back walks to Josh Donaldson and Bautista, who both worked nine-pitch at bats.

Afterward, Volquez said Donaldson was “crying like a baby” over his inside approach. Relievers Kelvin Herrera, Ryan Madson and Luke Hochevar held the Jays to one hit over three innings.

That was a big reason why they were able to down the Astros in their divisional series. They made several dynamic fielding plays in Game 5 of the ALDS, including a great catch by Zobrist and a sliding grab in foul territory by Gordon.