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Instant Reaction: Blue Jays bullpen blew a lead in 9-5 loss to the Orioles
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Photo credit: © Dan Hamilton-Imagn Images
Ryley Delaney
Mar 29, 2025, 18:00 EDTUpdated: Mar 29, 2025, 18:15 EDT
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Well, that wasn’t pretty.
On Saturday afternoon, the Toronto Blue Jays hosted the Baltimore Orioles for the third of four games in the series, falling 9-5 to the fellow bird team to bring their season record to 1-2. Let’s take a look at what happened in this game.
For the third consecutive game, the Orioles opened the scoring with a home run, as Colton Cowser hit his first of the season, leading off for the Orioles in the top of the first. Three batters later, Jordan Westburg hit his second of the season to put the Orioles up 2-0.
But the Blue Jays fought back. Anthony Santander hit an RBI single to cut the Orioles’ lead in half. That was followed by Alejandro Kirk’s sacrifice fly to tie the game up at two. The best moment of this game for the Jays came thanks to Andrés Giménez, who hit his second home run as a Blue Jay in the bottom of the third to make it 4-2 for the Jays.
It was all downhill for the Jays from there, though. In the top of the fourth, Gary Sánchez hit a sac fly to bring the Orioles to within one, followed by Ramón Urías’ double that scored three runs to give the Orioles a 6-4 lead.
The following inning, the Orioles scored runs thanks to Cedric Mullins’ RBI single and a sac fly from Heston Kjerstad to extend their lead to 8-4. In the bottom half of the fifth, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. grounded out to drive in a run, but that’s all the Jays would get. Westburg put the game away with his second homer of the game.

Takeaways…

Max Scherzer gave up two home runs in the first inning and pitched just three innings, with 45 pitches. Concerningly, he was pulled from the game with what was called right lat soreness. Not great.
The game was lost when Richard Lovelady and Jacob Barnes pitched. Coming into the fourth inning after Scherzer was pulled, the Jays had a 4-2 lead. However, Lovelady gave up four earned runs in an inning pitched, and Barnes gave up two earned runs in an inning and a third.
Bo Bichette looks fantastic this season as he’s carrying the success he found in Spring Training. On Saturday, he was 4-4 with two doubles and two runs scored, giving him a .500/.571/.667 slash line in 14 plate appearances. It’s still very early, but this is encouraging.
Andrés Giménez also looks great to start the season, as he hit his second home run as a Blue Jay in this game. It took him 38 games, or until May 12, to hit two home runs with the Guardians last season.
Jeff Hoffman made his debut with the Blue Jays (in the big leagues). He pitched an inning with a strikeout and a hit allowed, the same outing that Yimi García had. Chad Green also pitched in this game, giving up a home run and striking out two.
The Jays have a chance to avoid their first series loss on Sunday, as they take on the Orioles in the series finale at 1:37 PM ET. Chris Bassitt is expected to start the game.
Ryley Delaney is a Nation Network writer for Blue Jays Nation, Oilersnation, and FlamesNation. They can be followed on Twitter @Ryley__Delaney.

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