Blue Jays fall to Kershaw, Dodgers

Clayton Kershaw was too much for the Blue Jays’ bats to handle as Toronto fell 6-2 to the Los Angeles Dodgers on Saturday afternoon at the Rogers Centre.

R.A. Dickey was unsteady early on, allowing a solo home run to Joc Pederson to open the scoring before some seeing-eye singles filled the bases for a three-run inning in the third.

Keeping his pitch count down, however, Dickey pitched very strong from that point on to last seven innings, striking out three and walking one. Only two of his four runs against were earned.

Kershaw worked seven shutout innings for the Dodgers, allowing eight hits but striking out ten.

Darwin Barney broke the Blue Jays through in the bottom of the second, starting again over Ryan Goins. Barney stayed inside the Kershaw pitch to push a single the other way, scoring Justin Smoak from third. Barney added another single later in the game and was driven home by a Kevin Pillar double.

Barney did commit two uncharacteristic fielding errors, however, the second coming in the ninth on what should have been an inning-ending double-play. On the very next play, a sac-fly to centre-field, Kevin Pillar added another highlight to his ever-growing reel with a diving catch on a ball hit by Carl Crawford.

Chad Girodo made his first appearance out of the bullpen since being recalled, but made one mistake against Justin Turner that found the seats in left field.

Joe Biagini pitched the ninth inning for the Blue Jays, allowing an unearned run and recording one strikeout.

Facing a left-hander, manager John Gibbons elected to keep Pillar in the leadoff spot with Michael Saunders batting seventh.

In the series rubber match in Sunday afternoon, Marco Estrada is scheduled to start for the Blue Jays against Ross Stripling.