SEATTLE — Grim odds faced the Toronto Blue Jays the last time they pulled up to T-Mobile Park to face the Seattle Mariners. They trailed the American League Championship Series 2-0 after dropping the first two games at home, and only four of the 30 teams in such dire circumstances during previous post-seasons had rallied to advance.
But six strong innings of two-run ball from Shane Bieber, combined with five homers by the offence, produced a 13-4 win in Game 3. The Blue Jays took Game 4 as well before losing the last of the three in Seattle, and then recovering, of course, to win the final two at home to reach the World Series.
“Fond memories, an incredible series, a hard-fought series. We were definitely on our heels going into Game 3,” said Bieber, who “loved” the challenge of starting such a pivotal game. “Max (Scherzer) and I were talking about it the other day — there's something about being a road dog. It's a fun thing to embrace. Obviously, you'd prefer not to be down 2-0, or just down in general, but that's what baseball is all about. And the team that we had last year was ready for it. So it's a fun thing to embrace and a great challenge, always.”
The stakes won’t be nearly as high this weekend, although the Blue Jays, still untracked at 41-46 through three bumpy months of injury and roster churn, are once again looking to turn their fortunes on the West Coast. This nine-game trip to Seattle, San Francisco and San Diego is an opportunity to make up ground before the all-star break.
It begins Friday, when Dylan Cease faces off with Luis Castillo, followed by Bieber versus Logan Gilbert on Saturday and Trey Yesavage against George Kirby in Sunday’s finale.
Just as they did last October, the Blue Jays are once again simply seeking wins to build on.
“Definitely. It's a game of momentum, right? It comes and goes, especially throughout a seven-game series; it's very rare to sweep, so you're going to have to ride those ups and downs and make the best of it as best as you can,” said Bieber. “In a sense, that's what we're trying to do with this season as we're looking forward. It's nice to look back, and we look back on those memories fondly, but we've also got to look forward to what's in front of us. We'll try to garner some momentum here and keep it rolling.”
Manager John Schneider, still trying to get his team playing more in sync, feels there’s some benefit in returning to the “heightened sense of awareness and competitiveness” from “a really, really emotional time of the year last year.”
“They're a damn good team,” he said of the Mariners, who have similarly spun their wheels to this point in 2026. “We like playing there. We can enjoy the atmosphere there. I think it'll be good for the guys, honestly.”
Bieber will be watching the opener closely to see how Seattle hitters approach Cease, seeking nuggets he can apply to his outing Saturday.
The right-hander will be making his third start since returning from elbow inflammation that cost him the first half of the season, looking to make more progress with mechanical adjustments to get him “moving a little bit more athletically down the mound.”
Finding consistency with such patches doesn’t usually happen “from start to start; they kind of take a little while,” said Bieber, who at the same time acknowledged “there's no real time to make adjustments, results-wise at least.”
“I've got to go out there and compete and expect to win ball games. That's my job,” he continued. “I'm not going to tell you exactly how I want to attack Seattle, but I think that first game is going to tell us a lot about how they want to approach our pitching staff. Obviously, Dylan throws very hard, but we both, I feel like, rely on our hard-breaking stuff. Seeing what each guy's plan of attack is against him can maybe give me a little bit of a cue going into the next game.”
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Miles turns up the heat: Wednesday’s bullpen day in a 9-3 win over the New York Mets couldn’t have gone much better as the Blue Jays got one inning from opener Braydon Fisher, three innings from a dominant Spencer Miles and a five-inning save from the just-demoted-from-the-rotation Patrick Corbin.
That spot only comes up once more before the all-star break — Tuesday in San Francisco — and Miles will be available for bulk duties on five days of rest after sitting 97.5 m.p.h. with his fastball and topping out at 99.4, a personal best.
John Schneider said the three shutout innings of one-hit, one-walk, five-strikeout ball were “the best I've seen him throw.”
“He's always had a very good mentality and a very good demeanour. I don't know if it was Canada Day or the red jersey or what, but he seemed like just a different guy a little bit,” he continued. “But it was impressive, both the stuff and the execution of it. I'm kind of running out of things to say about him.”
Miles didn’t have an explanation for the velo bump, but in this remarkable season of self-discovery for the 25-year-old, who’d only logged 23.1 innings of pro ball over the past three years due to injuries, it’s another benchmark.
“When you see it once,” he said of hitting 99, “it's like a chain has broken loose. Now your brain will be like, all right, I can accelerate and keep going up while throwing strikes, not out of control. It's kind of a confidence thing and then, like, a chain has been broken, and I can keep doing it now.”
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Key for Keys: A focal point for Blue Jays rookie Sean Keys entering this season was refining his mental approach at the plate, learning to more effectively sit on certain pitches based on pitcher tendencies in certain counts.
His first big-league home run was a by-product of that. Having struck out on a curveball in his first at-bat versus Freddy Peralta, he took another hook in the first pitch of his second at-bat and then on the next offering sent a fastball over the left-field wall.
In between at-bats as the DH, he spoke to hitting coach David Popkins and assistant Lou Iannotti and then went to hit off the Trajekt machine to set himself up for the milestone swing.
“It's the most refined level because it's the best of the best, so trying to take what I've used and succeeded at in the minor leagues and then trying to have the best approach,” Keys said.
“I love the way the Blue Jays put together the scouting reports on pitchers. I've become accustomed to it, so I know where to look and what I'm looking for, whether it's the fastball or what off-speed pitches they have, velocity.”
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