For the second time in three days, the Blue Jays and the Indians needed extra innings to determine a winner. This marks the first time in Blue Jays history that the team has started the season with back-to-back extra inning games, and the first time since 2007 that this has happened in Major League Baseball.
Both the Blue Jays’ and the Indians’ hitters had difficulty getting things started today, as both Brandon Morrow and Ubaldo Jimenez each pitched seven innings, giving up only one hit and two runs.
The Blue Jays seemed to have won the game in the top of the ninth inning when Kelly Johnson hit a solo home run with no men out off of Indians reliever Vinnie Pestano. The Blue Jays continued to hit well in the top of the ninth, but could not muster another run in the inning, leaving base runners on first and third base to end the inning.
This proved costly to Toronto, as new Blue Jays closer Sergio Santos blew his first save opportunity of the season, giving up a solo home run to shortstop Asdrubal Cabrera to open the bottom of the ninth inning. Santos recovered to retire the next two batters, sending the game to extra innings.
The 10th and 11th innings were scoreless, and neither teams could record a hit as fans feared that this game may be headed into the evening as was the case on Thursday.
Toronto broke the game open in the top of the 12th after a Rajai Davis double scored both Edwin Encarnacion and Brett Lawrie, who scored all the way from first base. The Blue Jays would add two more runs in the inning, which proved to be enough even though Cleveland would add one run in the bottom of the inning. The Blue Jays prevailed once again by a score of 7-4.
Casey Janssen, who was a perfect 6-0 last season, won his first game of the season as the Blue Jays improved to 2-0.
The Indians look to avoid the series sweep tomorrow, as veteran Derek Lowe faces off against Toronto rookie Joel Carreno at 1:05 PM EST.
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