Promised eruption arrives in Blue Jays' romp

Charlie Montoyo has been saying it for days about the Blue Jays’ offense: We’re gonna hit. Just be patient. It’s coming.

After eight games and a two-hour-and-40-minute rain delay, Toronto’s offensive breakout was well worth the wait.

Montoyo’s comments came in the context of Toronto lacking its full arsenal of weapons, including its top offseason acquisition (George Springer) and its reigning Silver Slugger Award winner (Teoscar Hernández). But the Blue Jays’ manager has expressed faith in his lineup’s ability to put together a complete performance -- even as an incomplete group.

That complete performance took shape in one weird and wonderful half-inning on Saturday, as the Blue Jays rode an early seven-run frame to a 15-1 victory over the Angels at TD Ballpark in Dunedin, Fla. In a game that wrapped in the wee hours of Sunday morning, Toronto posted its first double-digit hit total of 2021 and scored more runs than in its past four games combined.

• Box score

“We all needed a night like this,” Montoyo said. “Not a late night like this, but a night at the plate like that. … Great at-bats, the walks, the guys were patient.”

The aforementioned weirdness came with two on and none out in the second inning, when Danny Jansen hit a grounder to the right side. Albert Pujols threw to second for José Iglesias, whose return throw to first missed badly because he was simultaneously slid into by Jonathan Davis. In a strange turn of events, both managers sought a replay review for different reasons, and both rulings went in the Blue Jays' favor. Davis was ultimately awarded second base (Iglesias was off the bag by the time he caught theball), Jansen was safe at first -- and Santiago Espinal raced home from second with the game's first run.

Josh Palacios followed with a perfect bunt down the third-base line for his first MLB hit, and he scored on a three-run double from Randal Grichuk. That was only the beginning of a truly special night for Palacios, who went 4-for-4 with one walk, one RBI and four runs scored. He became the third player in the modern era to collect four-plus hits and score four-plus runs in one of his first two games.

Palacios noted this spring that spending 2020 at Toronto’s alternate training site in Rochester, N.Y., was “one of the best things that could happen to my career,” given that there were no leaderboards or box scores. He practiced his two-strike approach without fear of striking out, and he worked on stealing bases without fear of getting caught.

And now he’s putting his refined skills to work on the biggest stage of his career.

“He in two games already has more hits than I [would] in a month,” Montoyo deadpanned. “So it’s great to see. He was fun to watch. He had family or something here, and you could hear it because the crowd wasn’t too [full].”

In addition to Palacios, offensive accolades up and down the lineup were almost too great to count: Espinal, fresh off meeting his hero, posting the second three-hit night of his career; Bo Bichette collecting a career-high five RBIs; and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. stretching his on-base streak to nine games by reaching four times.

Montoyo has watched his hitters expand the zone too often this season, racking up a franchise-high 84 strikeouts through the first eight games. But they shrunk the zone Saturday, drawing nine walks -- more than twice as many as in any prior game in 2021.

Perhaps no one will be lost in the shuffle as much as Steven Matz, who held the Angels to five hits, one run and an 84.7-mph average exit velocity in six quality innings. But hey, this game belonged to the bats, which finally showed up in a major way for Toronto.

“We know this lineup is really, really good, and so it’s fun to see them gel together,” Matz said.

Not 12 hours after dishing out their biggest beatdown of the season, the Blue Jays will have to see if there’s anything left in the offensive tank for Sunday’s matinee.