As autumn comes around with a new month, the Toronto Blue Jays have been on a mission: spoil every contender’s dream. 

While the Blue Jays have been rocky when facing their opponents for some part of the summer, they have since successfully become a nightmare-inducing team for at least a couple of contenders.
There was never an expectation for the Blue Jays to sweep or win a series against any contenders and in fact, they have lost several series because they’ve become a worse team since the trade deadline. Series losses in August against the Baltimore Orioles, Chicago Cubs, Cincinnati Reds, New York Yankees and Oakland Athletics reinforced Toronto’s inherent inability to score consistent runs and prevent runs.
The tide started to turn as the Blue Jays prepared a long series against the Boston Red Sox at the end of August. Instead of adding more pessimism to the team that doesn’t have much to play for this season, the Blue Jays have proved to be the thorn in the side of playoff hopefuls. The four-game series against Boston, including a makeup game from June 26, was supposed to bring more misery to Toronto. But the Canadian team rose to the challenge and took away three games in Fenway Park. In turn, the Blue Jays kept the Red Sox out of the playoff picture as they sat three and a half games out from securing the last Wild Card spot in the American League.
Something Toronto showed through their grinding series in Boston was the fact that they are a pretty good non-playoff team that can’t be underestimated. Before this division rival series, the Red Sox were more than confident in their playoff run and were ready to take over one of the Wild Card spots after the series. However, they were left to re-evaluate their offence and pitching as they failed to defeat their opponent. Boston surely has younger talents and better performance all across its roster, but it was undeniable that the current list of players wasn’t enough to take things to the next level just yet. The Blue Jays simply confirmed the Red Sox’s weaknesses by taking advantage of their struggles.
As the Blue Jays hopped on the road again to face the surging Minnesota Twins, their mission was only going to become more difficult. That proved true as Toronto helplessly faltered against Minnesota’s dominant starting pitcher, Pablo López, and took a loss with a score of 2-0. This came as no surprise as the Blue Jays have <a href="https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/TOR/2024-schedule-scores.shtml">scored</a> three or fewer runs in over 60 games this season. But in order to make the playoff picture much more fascinating, Toronto needed to come back with a vengeance against Minnesota. And they did just that on Saturday evening.
Just when the Twins were ready to offer a replay of the Wild Card series nightmare from last year (for those who missed it, the Twins swept the Blue Jays in the American League Wild Card series), Canada’s only team struck first to crush their dreams. Minnesota’s rookie pitcher Zebby Matthews had no idea what he was up against as he hoped to continue his remarkable rookie run in the majors. Little did he know, one hit by pitch, five singles, two doubles and three home runs and surrendered a whopping nine runs as he left the game after the top of the second inning.
The Blue Jays continued to mercilessly punish the Twins by keeping their lineup from scoring any runs, all the while scoring three more runs to make the score 12-0. Soon after, Toronto tacked on three more runs off position player pitching as Minnesota waved a white flag. Toronto’s starting pitcher José Berríos was also instrumental in delivering a squeaky clean shutout along with relievers Tommy Nance, Erik Swanson and Ryan Burr.
The Blue Jays have effectively delivered a whiplash to the Twins as they prepare for playoff baseball. Not only have the Blue Jays exposed the Twins’ starting pitching depth down the stretch, but they have also added more question marks to Minnesota’s lineup performance and construction.
There is a possibility that this could be a gigantic blip for the roaring Twins. Every team has an off day, which could be one of those days. However, if this pattern continues to show down the road, Minnesota and credit Toronto for revealing its flaws earlier. Not all bad teams can test a contender&#8217;s abilities. Only the good among the bad are qualified to measure contenders’ capability. The Blue Jays are now taking up the mantle to become a litmus test for contenders as they strive to understand their limitations and strengths.
Should the Blue Jays manage to defeat the Twins once more on Sunday, they would have done enough to mess around with the playoff picture. It won’t be enough to push Minnesota out of the playoffs, but it would be enough for the team to throw around the question of “what if” by the end of the season. 
To teams around the league, Toronto has been nothing but wildly inconsistent and surprisingly mediocre this year. There was a reason why the Blue Jays were labelled as a “paper tiger” once again, to their dismay. Yet, as summer faded, Toronto decided to expose each contender’s flaws one by one. The Canadian team has already provided the necessary reckoning to Boston and Minnesota and it may be on its way to do so in September as they face more contenders, especially in the National League.
When the Twins turned on Backstreet Boys’ hit song “I Want It That Way” at the top of the ninth with infielder Kyle Farmer pitching in Target Field, something about the lyrics was profoundly poetic. Ain’t nothin’ but a heartache. Ain’t nothin’ but a mistake. Who knew the Blue Jays were capable of creating this much heartbreak, anguish and shock?

As autumn comes around with a new month, the Toronto Blue Jays have been on a mission: spoil every contender’s dream. 



While the Blue Jays have been rocky when facing their opponents for some part of the summer, they have since successfully become a nightmare-inducing team for at least a couple of contenders.

There was never an expectation for the Blue Jays to sweep or win a series against any contenders and in fact, they have lost several series because they’ve become a worse team since the trade deadline. Series losses in August against the Baltimore Orioles, Chicago Cubs, Cincinnati Reds, New York Yankees and Oakland Athletics reinforced Toronto’s inherent inability to score consistent runs and prevent runs.

The tide started to turn as the Blue Jays prepared a long series against the Boston Red Sox at the end of August. Instead of adding more pessimism to the team that doesn’t have much to play for this season, the Blue Jays have proved to be the thorn in the side of playoff hopefuls. The four-game series against Boston, including a makeup game from June 26, was supposed to bring more misery to Toronto. But the Canadian team rose to the challenge and took away three games in Fenway Park. In turn, the Blue Jays kept the Red Sox out of the playoff picture as they sat three and a half games out from securing the last Wild Card spot in the American League.

Something Toronto showed through their grinding series in Boston was the fact that they are a pretty good non-playoff team that can’t be underestimated. Before this division rival series, the Red Sox were more than confident in their playoff run and were ready to take over one of the Wild Card spots after the series. However, they were left to re-evaluate their offence and pitching as they failed to defeat their opponent. Boston surely has younger talents and better performance all across its roster, but it was undeniable that the current list of players wasn’t enough to take things to the next level just yet. The Blue Jays simply confirmed the Red Sox’s weaknesses by taking advantage of their struggles.

As the Blue Jays hopped on the road again to face the surging Minnesota Twins, their mission was only going to become more difficult. That proved true as Toronto helplessly faltered against Minnesota’s dominant starting pitcher, Pablo López, and took a loss with a score of 2-0. This came as no surprise as the Blue Jays have <a href="https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/TOR/2024-schedule-scores.shtml">scored</a> three or fewer runs in over 60 games this season. But in order to make the playoff picture much more fascinating, Toronto needed to come back with a vengeance against Minnesota. And they did just that on Saturday evening.

Just when the Twins were ready to offer a replay of the Wild Card series nightmare from last year (for those who missed it, the Twins swept the Blue Jays in the American League Wild Card series), Canada’s only team struck first to crush their dreams. Minnesota’s rookie pitcher Zebby Matthews had no idea what he was up against as he hoped to continue his remarkable rookie run in the majors. Little did he know, one hit by pitch, five singles, two doubles and three home runs and surrendered a whopping nine runs as he left the game after the top of the second inning.

The Blue Jays continued to mercilessly punish the Twins by keeping their lineup from scoring any runs, all the while scoring three more runs to make the score 12-0. Soon after, Toronto tacked on three more runs off position player pitching as Minnesota waved a white flag. Toronto’s starting pitcher José Berríos was also instrumental in delivering a squeaky clean shutout along with relievers Tommy Nance, Erik Swanson and Ryan Burr.

The Blue Jays have effectively delivered a whiplash to the Twins as they prepare for playoff baseball. Not only have the Blue Jays exposed the Twins’ starting pitching depth down the stretch, but they have also added more question marks to Minnesota’s lineup performance and construction.

There is a possibility that this could be a gigantic blip for the roaring Twins. Every team has an off day, which could be one of those days. However, if this pattern continues to show down the road, Minnesota and credit Toronto for revealing its flaws earlier. Not all bad teams can test a contender's abilities. Only the good among the bad are qualified to measure contenders’ capability. The Blue Jays are now taking up the mantle to become a litmus test for contenders as they strive to understand their limitations and strengths.

Should the Blue Jays manage to defeat the Twins once more on Sunday, they would have done enough to mess around with the playoff picture. It won’t be enough to push Minnesota out of the playoffs, but it would be enough for the team to throw around the question of “what if” by the end of the season. 

To teams around the league, Toronto has been nothing but wildly inconsistent and surprisingly mediocre this year. There was a reason why the Blue Jays were labelled as a “paper tiger” once again, to their dismay. Yet, as summer faded, Toronto decided to expose each contender’s flaws one by one. The Canadian team has already provided the necessary reckoning to Boston and Minnesota and it may be on its way to do so in September as they face more contenders, especially in the National League.

When the Twins turned on Backstreet Boys’ hit song “I Want It That Way” at the top of the ninth with infielder Kyle Farmer pitching in Target Field, something about the lyrics was profoundly poetic. Ain’t nothin’ but a heartache. Ain’t nothin’ but a mistake. Who knew the Blue Jays were capable of creating this much heartbreak, anguish and shock?

These young Toronto Blue Jays have been a thorn in the side of playoff hopefuls

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