A throwing error on Ernie Clement’s 10th-inning bunt allowed the winning run to score as the Toronto Blue Jays defeated the visiting Los Angeles Angels 4-3 on Friday for their sixth straight victory.
After Nathan Lukes led off the 10th with a walk, Clement dropped a bunt. Angels reliever Sam Bachman (1-2) threw wildly to first, and automatic runner Myles Straw scored.
Toronto’s Chad Green (3-2) pitched around a hit batter in the top of the 10th.
The Blue Jays and extended their lead in the American League East to two games over both the New York Yankees and the Tampa Bay Rays.
Jo Adell had a three-run homer and a double to extend his hit streak to 15 games for the Angels, who have alternated wins and losses for eight games.
Toronto’s Eric Lauer and the Angels Kyle Hendricks hooked up in a pitching duel until the sixth in the opener of a three-game series. Neither factored in the decision.
Lauer allowed two runs, three hits and one walk with six strikeouts over six-plus innings. Hendricks gave up three runs, four hits and no walks in 5 1/3 innings. He struck out two.
Toronto scored three times to break a scoreless tie in the sixth inning.
Will Wagner doubled off the wall in center field, took third on Tyler Heineman’s sacrifice bunt and scored on Andres Gimenez’s single to left.
George Springer grounded a single to center, and Gimenez hobbled into third. Leo Jimenez pinch-ran for Gimenez as Jose Fermin replaced Hendricks.
Bo Bichette grounded an RBI single to left. Another run scored when shortstop Zach Neto flubbed Addison Barger’s potential double-play chopper for an error.
Los Angeles’ Mike Trout opened the seventh with an infield hit on a trickler along the third base line, and he took second when Taylor Ward lined a single off the left field wall. Nick Sandlin replaced Lauer, and Adell smashed the reliever’s third pitch for mammoth homer to center, tying the game.
It was Adell’s 19th long ball of the year.
–Field Level Media
