Jose Bautista, Edwin Encarnacion and Troy Tulowitzki each hit solo home runs in the first inning, while Marco Estrada ended a four-start winless streak as the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Baltimore Orioles 6-5 on Friday.
Encarnacion reached base three times and scored twice as the Blue Jays won the opener of a three-game series between the top two teams in the American League East, cutting Baltimore’s division lead to half a game. The Orioles have lost four straight.
Estrada (6-4) allowed four runs, three earned, and five hits in six innings.
Photo: AP
Joaquin Benoit worked the seventh, while Jason Grilli gave up Manny Machado’s solo home run in the eighth and Roberto Osuna finished for his 22nd save.
Mark Trumbo’s two-out double gave Baltimore a 2-0 lead in the top of the first, but the Blue Jays answered with a trio of solo shots in the bottom half.
Bautista drilled Kevin Gausman’s second pitch of the game off the facing of the second deck, Encarnacion hit a one-out blast and Tulowitzki added a two-out homer.
Jon Lester recovered from a recent string of bad starts, pitching six scoreless innings that led the Chicago Cubs over the Seattle Mariners 12-1 for their third straight win.
Jason Heyward and David Ross homered for the National League Central leaders.
Lester (11-4) gave up four hits, struck out seven and walked two.
Rougned Odor homered twice, while A.J. Griffin pitched into the sixth inning as the Texas Rangers beat the Kansas City Royals 8-3.
Jurickson Profar also went deep for the Rangers and scored three runs.
Eric Hosmer homered for the defending World Series champion Royals, who dropped to 10 games behind Cleveland, who had a 5-3 win against Oakland, in the AL Central.
Tommy Pham homered and drove in three runs, leading the St Louis Cardinals over the Miami Marlins 11-6.
Kolten Wong had three hits and drove in two runs, while Jeremy Hazelbaker hit a two-run homer for St Louis. The Cardinals have won four of five and lead the Marlins by one game in the NL wild-card standings.
Marlins outfielder Ichiro Suzuki went 0-for-4 to remain at 2,998 career hits.
Yasmani Grandal’s RBI single capped a five-run, seventh-inning rally that carried the Los Angeles Dodgers to a wild 9-7 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Joc Pederson and Chase Utley each hit two-run home runs in the deciding rally as the Dodgers erased a 7-3 deficit.
Paul Goldschmidt capped a three-hit night with a bases-loaded double off Pedro Baez (3-2).
Rick Porcello pitched a five-hitter for his first complete game since 2014, while Xander Bogaerts homered and drove in three runs as the Boston Red Sox beat the Los Angeles Angels 6-2.
Porcello (14-2) struck out three while winning his sixth straight start — also for the first time since 2014 — and eighth consecutive decision.
Elsewhere, the Washington Nationals turned the first triple play in their 12-season history, holding on in the eighth inning to help preserve a strong outing by Max Scherzer and beat the San Francisco Giants 4-1.
Carlos Gonzalez homered and drove in four runs as the Colorado Rockies defeated the New York Mets 6-1, while the Atlanta Braves beat the Philadelphia Phillies 2-1, the Detroit tigers thrashed the Houston Astros 14-6 and the Tampa Bay Rays cooled off the surging New York Yankees 5-1.
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