Have A Day Jose!

Jose Bautista continues to be the offensive catalyst for the Blue Jays, as they sweep the Minnesota Twins 11-3 for their fifth consecutive win.

No words can describe the torrid pace Bautista has been on since September 2009. He slugged three home runs today (first career three-home run game, five in the series) and four runs batted in (RBIs). He even added another opposite field round tripper on his final home run of the day. Bautista is just getting great swings and making pitchers pay for their mistakes on location. His hands move like no other I have seen through the hitting zone. Bautista now leads the majors with 16 home runs on the campaign. He is without a doubt the early candidate for A.L. M.V.P. this year. What held him back from winning the award in 2010 was his batting average which sits second best so far in 2011 at .358 (two points back of Matt Joyce of the Tampa Bay Rays). His contract is looking better and better after every at bat.

The rest of the Blue Jays offence jumped on Brian Duensing early with seven runs on eight hits knocking him out after only three innings. Jose Molina was a bright spot today going 3-for-4 with an RBI and scoring a pair of runs. Probably the best play was when he moved up to third on a Yunel Escobar fly ball to centre catching Denard Span and the Twins defence by surprise, which resulted in him scoring on the next at bat by Cory Patterson.

Brandon Morrow picked up his second victory of the season in five innings of work. He looked sharp early retiring the first seven hitters he faced and striking out five through three innings. But a high pitch count and some trouble in the fourth and fifth ended his day premature. In all, Morrow finished with eight strikeouts.

Noteables:

J. Bautista: 3-for-5; 3 HR, 4 RBI
J. Molina: 3-for-4; 2B, 2 singles, 2 R, RBI
A. Hill: 2-for-5; 2B, 2 RBI

Pitching lines:

B. Morrow (W, 2-2) 5 IP, 5 H, 3 ER, 2 BB, 8 SO, 106 pitches
B. Duensing (L, 2-3) 3 IP, 8 H, 7 ER, 2 BB, 1 SO, 1 HR, 62 pitches

The Blue Jays are back at .500 after 40 games at 20-20, as they head into Detroit tomorrow for a two-game miniseries and their only stop this year to the Motor City. Kyle Drabek (2-2, 4.81) toes the rubber for Toronto in the opening game of the series and faces Max Scherzer (6-0, 3.20).

Until next time,

Let’s Go Blue Jays!

Twitter: @ChaseHadden