Matt Duffy goes deep, Rays stumble in Toronto

TORONTO (AP) — Tampa Bay managed just three hits and lost 4-1 to the Toronto Blue Jays on Saturday, damaging the Rays‘ chances of hosting the AL Wild Card Game.

Matt Duffy homered in the seventh inning, but that was it for Tampa Bay. Duffy finished with two hits and Tommy Pham singled for the team’s other hit.

The Rays (96-65), who clinched a postseason berth Friday when they beat Toronto and Washington beat Cleveland, began the day tied with Oakland in the wild-card race. The Athletics won four of six regular-season meetings with the Rays, giving them the head-to-head tiebreaker.

Oakland visited Seattle on Saturday night. Tampa Bay could still host the wild-card game if the Athletics lose their final two and the Rays beat the Blue Jays on Sunday.

Teoscar Hernandez hit his 25th homer for Toronto, and Trent Thornton (6-9) pitched five effective innings. Rowdy Tellez had two hits and drove in a run.

The Blue Jays jumped on Ryan Yarbrough (11-6) for three runs before he recorded his first out of the game.

Hernandez connected for his second career leadoff homer. Cavan Biggio then singled and scored on Randal Grichuk‘s triple. Tellez added an RBI single.

Yarbrough allowed three runs and five hits in five innings.

Thornton settled down nicely after a shaky first. The right-hander allowed one hit, struck out eight and walked four.

Thornton’s 149 strikeouts is the highest total by a Blue Jays rookie since Mark Eichhorn had 166 in 1986.

Ken Giles worked the ninth for his 23rd save in 24 opportunities.

After Duffy hit his first homer of the season off Sam Gaviglio, Richard Ureña restored Toronto’s three-run cushion with an RBI double in the bottom half of the inning.

ROOF REPORT

The retractable roof opened a few minutes before the game started, but rolled closed again after a light rain began falling in the first inning.

TRAINER’S ROOM

Rays: INF Yandy Díaz (left foot) got six at-bats in an instructional league game Saturday and will join the team in Toronto on Sunday. Díaz has been out since July 23 and is on the 60-day IL.

Blue Jays: 3B Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (right knee) was scratched from the starting lineup and replaced by Brandon Drury. … SS Bo Bichette (concussion) has been ruled out for the remainder of the season. Bichette was hit on the batting helmet by a pitch at Baltimore last Thursday.