Blue Jays bats held in check in 4-2 loss to D-Backs

Just as it seemed the Blue Jays lineup had figured out how to get back to their offensive juggernaut ways of last season, they came back down to earth, at least for one game.

Facing the Arizona Diamondbacks lefty starter Patrick Corbin, the Jays bats were held to two runs over 6.1 innings by Corbin.

And on a night when they were up against good pitching, their own starter wasn’t at his top-notch usual game. While not having a terrible night by any means, Blue Jays starter Marco Estrada went a solid 6 innings, giving up only 2 hits but allowing 3 earned runs on the back of 3 walks (to go with a stellar 8 strikeouts).

While this outing raised Estrada’s season ERA to 2.70 (nothing to scoff at by the way), he did still manage to keep his streak of games allowing 5 hits or fewer alive (it now sits at an MLB record eleven games).

The two runs that the Blue Jays did manage all came off the bat of centre-fielder Kevin Pillar. With two men on base in the bottom of the 4th inning (following a Michael Saunders double and a Troy Tulowitzki walk) Kevin Pillar ripped the ball into the gap for a double, scoring both the base runners.

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Along with his contribution with the bat, Kevin Pillar (as he always seems to do) came through clutch with the glove. In the 4th inning with 1 out Pillar tracked a deep fly to straight away centre, jumped up against the wall and came down with the ball safely secured in his glove.

While the play saved an extra base hit, it did lead to a minute of fear for the Blue Jays and their fans, as Pillar was slow to get up after slamming hard into the wall during the catch.

He would go on to remain in the game, and lucky he did as in the bottom of the inning he came up with his 2-run double.

As is to be expected when you call the Rogers Centre home, and when your starter Marco Estrada relies on marginal stuff and stellar command, the long ball hurt the Blue Jays in this game.

After the D-Backs scored their first run on a single by Chris Herrman, Arizona would go on to tack onto their lead thanks to a 2-run homer by Yasmani Tomas (who is starting to round into form as a legitimate major league hitter) as well as a solo shot by their young newly positioned outfielder (he came up through the system as a catcher) Peter O’Brien.

Next up for the Blue Jays they will be playing the Diamondbacks again tomorrow with the game set to start at 4:07 EST. It is slated to be a battle of lefty starters with the Blue Jays sending out JA Happ (8-3 3.41 ERA) to the mound to face up against the D-Backs own lefty Robbie Ray (4-5 4.44 ERA).