[Art Deco]

September 7: Placed OF Brandon Marsh on the 10-day IL with back stiffness.

Game 1: As mentioned the last time we played Toronto, the AI had made star pitcher Nate Pearson the Jays' closer, but now I guess it decided to end that experiment and he was back in the rotation and starting today. Wander Franco welcomed him back as a starter with a long and loud homer (#32) in the 1st inning and Seth Beer celebrated his return to the lineup by blasting a 2-run shot off him (#20) in the 4th to give the Rays the lead to stay in a 7-2 win. Chris Paddack got the start for the Rays and didn't have his best stuff, constantly battling runners on base, but got through to the tune of 5.1 7 2 2 2 2 to improve to 14-6 with one of the runs coming on a Cavan Biggio HR. With several lefties due up in the 6th, Aaron Ashby came on and actually did the job, getting out of the inning while it was still 3-2. Ty Buttrey finished the 7th, and Jose Alvarado looked good again with a perfect 2K inning in the 8th. After the lead was expanded in the bottom of the 8th to take away the save situation (it would have been Nick Anderson with Will Smith tired), TJ McFarland got three groundball outs in a perfect 9th to end the game. The additional runs in the 7th & 8th came off a wild pitch, a Keibert Ruiz groundout, a Yusniel Diaz sac fly and Nick Schnell's RBI double.

Game 2: Max Fried snapped out of his mini-slump which earned him a snowflake next to his name, going 7 strong innings in a 4-2 win over Toronto. Fried improved to 14-5 and got his ERA under 4 at 3.96 with a 7 4 1 1 4 7 outing. The walks were a bit of a concern, and after throwing 64 pitches in the first 3 innings, lasting 7 looked like a pipe dream but he settled down from there with great efficiency and finished with 105 pitches. Nick Anderson gave up a run in the 8th, but Will Smith had a clean 9th for save #34. The big blow in this game came from Trevor Larnach, whose 2-run HR in the 2nd gave the Rays the lead to stay. Wander (who leads the AL in WAR with 7.2) singled in a run in the 4th for RBI #111, and Alec Bohm blasted HR #35 in the 8th to give them a cushion late. In addition to his HR, Larnach doubled and threw out a runner at the plate who would tied the game in the 3rd. He's making a sneaky play to be an OF starter when Meadows comes back over Nick Schnell, who was 0-4 today and has dropped to 236/368/393 in 140 AB. Also in his favor is that he plays RF unlike Schnell which would allow Meadows to stay at his better position of LF. Of course Schnell got off to a similar red-hot start before slumping so we'll just have to see.

Game 3: Unlike past seasons the Rays had held Vlad Jr in check this year in dominating the season series. Until today, that is. The Blue Jay 3B had a 2-run HR, RBI double and then a 3-run HR as the Jays blasted the Rays 8-3. Daniel Lynch got the start while Keibert, Bohm and Wander all sat, and the first Vlad HR combined with an RBI single from Alejandro Kirk meant an immediate 3-0 hole, and a Triston Casas error in the 2nd led to Vlad's RBI double. Casas made up for the error by blasting HR #11 off Chris Archer in the 4th to cut the lead in half, but that was as close as the Rays would come today. Lynch did settle down after the rough start, but as he was running out of gas in the 6th he put 2 on with 2 out. Enter Scott Barlow to face Vlad, and well you have another entrant for the famous SNL "Bad Idea Jeans" skit as it instantly became 8-2. Barlow stayed in the rest of the way and threw 3 1/3 scoreless after that. Vidal Brujan added HR #12, doubling his total from last season, to round out the scoring. Archer beat the Rays for the second time this season at the Trop where he obviously feels at home.

September 10: Activated OF Austin Meadows from the 10-day IL.

Game 4: It was Ye Olde-Fashioned Pitcher's Duel today between Tyler Glasnow and Rick Porcello, and the Rays came out on top 2-0. Glasnow was actually less overpowering today than Porcello (who went 7 5 2 2 1 7), and had 3 walks and only 5 strikeouts in his 7 innings, but got the benefit of three double plays turned behind him to help keep Toronto off the board. After Porcello retired the first 11 Rays, Austin Meadows, fresh off the IL, re-introduced himself with his 31st HR of the year into the RF stands giving him 100 RBI for the season. That one run stood up until the 7th when Rafael Devers tripled and scored on a Porcello wild pitch. Nick Anderson took over for the 8th inning and got a rare 1-2-3 inning without a strikeout, and then Will Smith came on for the 9th getting Vlad Jr to ground out, giving up a hit, getting a strikeout and grabbing save #35. For a guy who was going a long time between save situations, Smith has now picked up 6 in the last 11 days. The win was #105, equaling last year's team record which of course will end up being shattered.

Team record: 105-40.