Blue Jays: “Maybe the baseball gods have changed their minds”

Last night was another good night for the Blue Jays, who handed the Red Sox their fifth straight loss.

Jose Soriano, in his first home start with his new team, pitched a quality start.

But most importantly, in the eighth inning, the team exploded. A big five-run inning allowed the Blue Jays to pull off a 6-4 win at Rogers Centre.

Aside from the bullpen's collapse in the ninth—which forced Louis Varland to finish the game—it was an excellent night.

It's actually the 10th win in 14 games for John Schneider's team. That's giving Schneider a renewed sense of hope.

Willson Contreras's dropped pop-up led the manager to say that his team might be back in the good graces of the baseball gods.

The manager says this because the team is in the midst of one of its best streaks of the season, with 10 wins in 14 games.

As I said on the Passion MLB podcast last night, one good week (and a half) doesn't make up for four bad months. We'll wait before getting our hopes up.

But it's a good sign, nonetheless.

Even though the team made trades at the deadline, Jose Soriano is an upgrade over Kevin Gausman, Brett Bateman is a solid replacement for Daulton Varsho, and the bullpen hasn't lost its key players.

But the team will have to prove it can keep winning on a regular basis if it hopes to make the playoffs. And Vladdy will have to step up.

That said, we can all agree that being a game and a half out of the playoffs is no small feat.

• The Padres are on the upswing.

• AAA: Anthony Volpe lost both of his team's challenges on his first at-bat of the game. Ouch.

• Freddie Freeman: Let's hope the veteran is okay.

• Three home runs for Alex Bregman.

• Riley Greene is injured.

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