CLEVELAND -- The book appears to be out on the Blue Jays’ offense and it’s centered around a steady diet of offspeed pitches.

Toronto's offense is off to one of its worst starts in franchise history and the approach from opposing pitchers is at least one reason why. Limit the fastballs, load up on the breaking balls and the Blue Jays' lineup has trouble adjusting, with the latest example coming in a 3-2 loss to Cleveland on Friday night when Carlos Santana hit a walk-off homer in the bottom of the ninth.

One night after Trevor Bauer threw just 42 fastballs, Toronto faced a similar approach from his teammate Shane Bieber. This time, the Indians' starter threw 41 fastballs compared to 31 sliders and 19 curveballs. The offspeed pitches resulted in 16 swinging strikes, five called strikes and just five balls put in play, with only one of them resulting in a hit.

"We're not doing a good job at the plate," Blue Jays manager Charlie Montoyo said. "I'm not going to sit here and say, 'We're working on this, we're working on that.' We're working on stuff but right now at the plate, we're struggling. I know it's coming. I don't know when it's coming, but it's going to come. We're struggling."

Toronto’s offensive woes through the first two weeks of the season have been pretty well documented. The Blue Jays have 51 hits this year, which is a franchise low through the first nine games of the season. The previous record was 57, which was set in 1981 and 2017. Toronto is currently slashing .180/.265/.314 and as a result the ballclub has lost four of its last five games despite the rotation delivering strong start after strong start.

The latest victim in the lack of run support was Trent Thornton, who allowed two runs, scattered three hits and two walks while striking out seven and throwing 53 of his 92 pitches for strikes. Thornton has 15 strikeouts this season, which is the most by any Blue Jays pitcher through the first two games of his career. The previous record was 13, which was set by Roy Halladay in 1998. The problem is Thornton didn’t get enough run support to win either outing.

The Blue Jays are batting .066 (5-for-76) the first time through the batting order this season. Not surprisingly, given those numbers, the club has been no-hit into the sixth in four of its eight games this season. Detroit’s Jordan Zimmermann and Matt Moore along with Baltimore’s David Hess and Cleveland’s Bauer all did it vs. Toronto. Brandon Drury made sure that didn’t happen on Friday with a single in the second inning vs. Bieber, but for the rest of the game it was a pretty similar story.

"It’s hard, especially because those guys are pretty good pitchers,” said Freddy Galvis, who provided one of the only bright spots on Friday night with a two-run homer in the fifth. “They plan and we have our plan and we have to stick with our plan and try to trust it and try to do it in the game. That’s the biggest thing. We have to stick with the plan and just play baseball."

The lack of offense is one reason the Blue Jays are 0-4 this season in one-run games. That was the issue again vs. Cleveland as the lack of early runs put even more pressure on a pitching staff that knows it doesn’t have much margin for error. Thornton delivered, as did Javy Guerra and Daniel Hudson, but the same could not be said for Joe Biagini, who served up the poorly located fastball that Santana sent over the wall in left field for the walk-off homer.

"We have to keep working and try to get better at things,” Galvis said. "Just don’t get too [emotional]. We know we are having a bad time right now hitting, especially in the early innings. We have to keep running. We have to keep working. If you keep working, something good is going to happen."

By the numbers

Blue Jays starters have allowed two runs or fewer in eight of their nine games this season. That’s tied with Oakland for the most in the Major Leagues … Toronto pitchers have combined to strike out a record 97 batters, which is the third most in MLB history through nine games of a season. Washington had 105 in 2014 and 100 in 2018 … Thornton is the first starter in the Majors to allow three hits or fewer and strike out at least seven batters in each of his first career starts since Boston’s Edwin Rodriguez in 2015. Thornton also became the first Blue Jays pitcher to strike out at least seven in his first two starts.