Blue Jays Week In Review: The good, the bad and the noteworthy for April 28

For the first time this season, the Toronto Blue Jays posted a losing record over a week's worth of action after they were swept by the Astros and lost two out of three to the Yankees.

The Blue Jays now sit at 13-15 on the year, marking the first time that they've been one game below .500 on the season. They've gone 3-7 over their last 10 games.

If there’s any consolation to looking at all the standings information this early, the Blue Jays have outperformed their expected record of 11-17, and that’s based on their minus-27 run differential.

They are the only team in the AL East who hasn’t scored at least 100 runs yet this season. Here’s a look at what they did good, bad, and noteworthy over the last seven days.

The good, the bad and the noteworthy for April 28

The Good: A late rally to avoid a winless week

The Blue Jays were one clutch Alejandro Kirk double on Friday night away from posting a winless week.

Kirk stepped into the batter's box against Devin Williams in the top of the ninth inning with the Blue Jays three outs away from losing their sixth straight game.

The Toronto catcher came up with two men on base in the top of the ninth at Yankee Stadium and proceeded to smash a ball to deep centerfield that scored George Springer and Andrés Giménez.

The Blue Jays began the inning down 2-1 with Williams on the mound, and the Jays had just a 16% chance to win. However, Williams (who entered the game with a 7.88 ERA in eight innings), struggled right out of the gate by giving up a leadoff single to Springer, before hitting Giménez with a 2-2 pitch.

That set the table for Kirk's double, which increased the Blue Jays' Win Probability to 89%. Jeff Hoffman made it 100% by closing the door in the bottom of the ninth.

It was Kirk's first extra-base hit since he had a double and a home run in a 7-6 win over Baltimore on April 13. It also marked just the second time in the Blue Jays' last eight games that they scored more than three runs in a single contest.

The Bad: They made every pitcher look like an ace

This week, the Blue Jays faced two legit aces in the Astros' Hunter Brown and the Yankees' Max Fried, but they also saw Ronel Blanco (5.01 ERA), Ryan Gusto (a rookie making his third big league start), Carlos Carrasco (5.26 ERA), and Clarke Schmidt (6.08 ERA).

Those four pitchers combined to have a 1.21 ERA with 17 strikeouts in 22 1/3 innings against the Blue Jays.

While the early part of the season gave Blue Jays fans optimism around the team's offense despite the lack of home runs since Toronto was still manufacturing runs.

Now the Jays are suddenly an easy team to pitch to, which has resulted in that optimism turning into pessimism.

From Gusto slicing the Blue Jays up with his game plan to Carrasco doing just enough to keep the Yankees in the game, opposing pitchers used all of their weapons to efficiently to keep Toronto's hitters off balance.

Gusto was using fastballs up and in and sweepers down and away against right-handed hitters, while also staying pitching away from left-handers. But his fastball sat at 94 miles per hour and none of his secondary pitches were incredibly overwhelming.

Carrasco’s fastball topped out at 92.5 MPH, and only 32 of 67 pitches were strikes, yet he only had two walks. The Blue Jays also somehow only made hard contact on eight of his pitches. These are the kind of pitchers the Blue Jays need to feast on.

The Noteworthy: A marathon inning for Kevin Gausman

Gausman was cruising in his start against the Yankees on Sunday afternoon in Game 1 of the day's doubleheader.

He got two outs on his strikeout and four on ground balls. and seemed to be posied for another strong outing.

Then the third inning happened.

Gausman couldn’t buy a strike on the corners, and ended up being pulled from the game after five walks, two hits and a bases-clearing double. He threw 53 pitches in the inning, which tied Woody Williams' "record."

Williams recorded his 53-pitch inning during a 11-5 loss to the Orioles on July 15, 1998.

To add insult to injury, Gausman was ejected from the game after being pulled in the third by manager John Schneider. Schneider was also ejected.

On Deck:

The Blue Jays can’t turn the page on this week soon enough, and they'll get a chance to turn things around on Tuesday when they take on the Red Sox in a three-game series.

Garrett Crochet will get the start for the Red Sox, while the Blue Jays have yet to name a starter.

These two teams squared off at Fenway Park earlier this month, and the Blue Jays took three of four from the Red Sox in that series. Meantime, the Cleveland Guardians will be in town for a weekend series in the Blue Jays' first games against an AL Central opponent this season.