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Lind's two blasts lead Jays to series win

Sep 18, 2011 - 10:31 PM Toronto, ON (Sports Network) - Adam Lind homered twice and Brandon Morrow tossed eight shutout innings, as the Toronto Blue Jays delayed Mariano Rivera's pursuit of history and earned a 3-0 victory over the New York Yankees in the rubber match of a three-game series at Rogers Centre.

Rivera notched his 601st save on Saturday to tie Trevor Hoffman's all-time mark and was not needed in Sunday's contest, as the Yankees mustered little offense with Derek Jeter, Curtis Granderson and Mark Teixeira all on the bench for a day of rest.

Morrow (10-11) entered the contest 0-4 in his previous five starts, but limited New York to four hits with a walk and eight strikeouts to win for the first time since August 17 at Seattle.

"I spotted my fastball pretty good and I had a good curveball today," Morrow said.

Frank Francisco worked around a one-out double in the ninth to notch his 16th save.

The Yankees still lead the AL East by 4 1/2 games over the Red Sox, who dropped an 8-5 decision to the Tampa Bay Rays. New York just wrapped up a 10-game road trip at 4-6 and will start an eight-game homestand with a makeup game against Minnesota on Monday. Tampa Bay then visits for four before Boston invades the Bronx next weekend.

Freddy Garcia (11-8) went the first 4 2/3 innings for New York and was charged with three runs on five hits and three walks. The veteran righty has been roughed up for 15 runs in 12 1/3 innings over his last three outings. Still, he had been 4-0 over his last seven starts and suffered his first loss since a 7-1 setback to Toronto on July 15.

"He just missed his spots," Yankees manager Joe Girardi said of his starter.

Eduardo Nunez had three of the five Yankee hits. He also had a baserunning gaffe after a sixth-inning single, trying to race to second after right fielder Jose Bautista threw behind him. Edwin Encarnacion easily took the throw at first and fired to second for the out.

The Yankees had two on with one out in the top of the first and tried to pull off a double steal, but trailing runner Robinson Cano was thrown out at second and Alex Rodriguez flied to right to end the threat.

Toronto took a 1-0 lead in the second when Lind led off the inning with his 25th home run of the season. Lind then clubbed his second of the game with one out in the fourth to make it 2-0.

The Jays tacked on another in the fifth and chased Garcia in the process. J.P. Arencibia walked with one out and raced all the way to third when Garcia threw away Mike McCoy's bunt single. Eric Thames followed with a sacrifice fly and Toronto went on to load the bases when Bautista singled and Lind walked. Luis Ayala took over on the mound and got Encarnacion on a fly ball to center.

Lind had a chance to blow the game open in the seventh with the bases loaded and one out against Raul Valdes, but was caught looking at a third strike. Encarnacion then grounded to third to keep it a three-run game.

The Yankees, though, got only a two-out single from Chris Dickerson in the eighth and a one-out double from Nunez in the ninth.

Game Notes

Lind was 6-for-12 in the series. He hadn't homered since September 3 against the Yankees...Morrow improved to 4-2 lifetime against the Yankees...Thames left the game in the seventh inning after swinging at a pitch and fouling the ball off his face...Rodriguez was back at third base for the Yankees and went 0-for-4 in his second straight game after missing six with a lingering thumb injury...The Yankees fell to 13-6 in rubber games this season, including 2-1 against Toronto. New York won the season series, 11-7...The Yankees also dropped to 40-12 in day games, still a big league best.