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Instant Reaction: Blue Jays close out Tigers series in dominant fashion
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Photo credit: © Rick Osentoski-Imagn Images
Tristan Morgan
May 17, 2026, 19:00 EDT
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After a stretch of games decided by the slimmest margins, what a relief for the Toronto Blue Jays to close out their series against the Tigers with a win like this. The Blue Jays won 4-1 in the perfect way to round out Sunday afternoon, with a Vladimir Guerrero Jr. home run to top it off. 
Guerrero Jr. had been moved to the two-hole for the first time since June 15th, 2025, and wasted zero time making manager John Schneider look like a genius. His solo home run in the first inning off Jack Flaherty was a thing of beauty, a frozen rope to left field with a launch angle of just 16 degrees.
It’s the lowest launch angle on any home run hit in Major League Baseball this season, and just one degree off the lowest of Guerrero’s career. The power has been a genuine concern through the early going. Entering Sunday, he hadn’t gone deep since April 20th, and it was his first extra-base hit in May. 
It bears noting that Guerrero Jr. isn’t fully out of the woods. However, his Statcast profile still shows an expected .365 xwOBA and a barrel rate of 8.6%, signs of hard contact that’s been running into bad luck as much as anything else. But this laser of a homerun was a step in the right direction, and the timing could not be better.
The Blue Jays are heading to a four-game set in Yankee Stadium starting tomorrow, where Guerrero Jr. has historically feasted: .308 with 16 home runs in 48 games in the Bronx. If there was ever a moment for the $500 million man to fully flip the switch, a four-game series against the biggest division rival is exactly it.
​​Daulton Varsho has also been heating up, and he showed it again today. The outfielder went 2-for-3 with an RBI triple, a double, and a walk. He’s now hitting .310 over the past two weeks, and his recent production has finally started to pay the dividends of his work to start hitting the ball with authority to all fields.
That triple in particular was a line drive that split the left-centre gap on a low and away fastball, which Varsho used to roll over consistently. That also marked just the second triple of the season for the Blue Jays, no longer being the only team with just one in MLB. 
Kevin Gausman had a fantastic comeback outing this afternoon after a difficult outing versus the Tampa Bay Rays last week. Six shutout innings with five strikeouts and just four hits allowed, bringing his ERA down to 3.45. Gausman’s strikeout totals aren’t quite as dominant as they were during his peak seasons, but he is still adapting and finding ways to work deep into games without striking out batters as frequently. This afternoon was him at his most reliable.
The way in which Gausman fits this specific 2026 roster is so crucial. Given the wave of injuries and the potential for shorter outings from the other established starters in this group, Gausman’s ability to adapt and be consistent (when he’s not tipping pitches) and be the same pitcher nearly every time he takes the mound is more magnified than ever.
Tyler Rogers came on for the ninth today after a busy outing for Louis Varland Saturday afternoon, which saw him go the ninth and tenth en route to a Blue Jays win. Rogers managed the ninth effectively and was able to close it out, picking up his first save as a member of the Blue Jays in the process.
Varland and Rogers may represent one of the best one-two punches to close out ballgames right now, as the two combine for a 1.04 ERA across 48.1 IP in one of the more underappreciated performances of the year so far for the Blue Jays. 
Flaherty, on the other side, has now seen his ERA balloon from 3.47 to 5.73 across his last four starts, and today went deeper than five innings for the first time since April 15th. Four runs, five hits, while still grinding through six innings. The Tigers have now dropped every single game he’s started this season. Five straight losses with him on the mound, and the answers don’t seem to be getting any better.
Detroit’s offence didn’t help him much either. Six hits on the day, and their lone run came on a pinch-hit groundout with the bases loaded in the bottom of the eighth, a jam that Joe Mantiply was otherwise able to contain and limit to just the one. Five total runs across the entire three-game series for a Tigers lineup that came in 13-7 at home. Even while the pitching staff is being held together with tape and optimism, the Blue Jays’ pitching staff continues to impress.
Detroit has now lost four straight series and 10 of its past 12 games. And similarly to the Blue Jays, the injury bug has run rampant on their big league roster as they look for something to stick soon. 
Toronto is now 21-25, heading to the Bronx. They picked up two of three from Detroit and accomplished their mission, but it’ll be hard to celebrate long when a four-game set against the Yankees begins tomorrow. This upcoming stretch is likely to feel like a series in July or August more than mid-May, as the embers of last fall’s ALDS faceoff between the two are soon to be ignited again. 
The Blue Jays’ road record is still an ugly 8-14. These next four games will say a lot about what this team actually is right now. However, this series win over the Tigers has continued to build on the momentum from last Wednesday’s walk-off grand slam.
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