Blue Jays 5 - 4 Guardians
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Bautista hits 2nd HR in 10th, Jays top Tribe

Jul 10, 2011 - 4:12 AM

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Cleveland, OH (Sports Network) - Jose Bautista belted his second homer of the game in the 10th inning, a solo blast that lifted the Toronto Blue Jays to a 5-4 win over the Cleveland Indians.

Bautista now has an MLB-leading 31 home runs, breaking the Blue Jays franchise record for homers before the All-Star break, which George Bell set with 29 in 1987. Bautista also is the first AL player to have at least 30 first-half homers since Alex Rodriguez of the Yankees had 30 in 2007.

Adam Lind added three hits and one RBI for the Blue Jays, who have won the last two games of this four-game series after dropping the opener on Travis Hafner's walkoff grand slam on Thursday.

Jon Rauch (3-3) suffered his third blown save of the year when Travis Buck ripped an RBI double to tie the game in the bottom of the ninth, but was bailed out by Bautista. Shawn Camp retired the side in order in the bottom of the 10th for his first save of 2011.

Grady Sizemore clubbed a two-run homer for the Indians and Matt LaPorta added an RBI in defeat.

Chris Perez (2-4) gave up the deciding home run.

After Toronto coughed up the lead in the ninth, Bautista got it back with one swing of the bat, crushing a Perez's 1-0 fastball deep over the wall in left.

Earlier, the Blue Jays wasted no time opening the scoring, as they plated a run in their first at-bat. Eric Thames ripped a one-out double to center and scored on an RBI single by Lind.

Cleveland tied the contest at one in the second. Carlos Santana walked and Sizemore roped a single to left to put runners on first and second with no outs. After a Buck fly out, LaPorta lofted a sacrifice fly to left to score Santana.

Toronto re-took the lead in the third on Bautista's first homer of the game, a solo shot deep into the left-field seats.

The Blue Jays extended their lead to 3-1 in the fourth. Travis Snider hit a single to center and hustled all the way around from first on a double into the right-center field gap by Jose Molina.

Cleveland fought back to tie the game at three in the fourth. After Santana worked a one-out walk, Sizemore deposited a fastball into the seats in right for his ninth home run of the season.

The Jays came back and took the lead again in the fifth. Thames was plunked by Indians starter Josh Tomlin with one out. Lind followed with a single into right which was mis-played by Buck, allowing Thames to advance to third. Then, Buck's throw into first hit Lind and kicked into shallow right which allowed Thames to score.

Hafner led off the ninth inning with a single up the middle. Pinch-runner Austin Kearns advanced to second on a ground out by Santana and moved to third on a groundout by Sizemore. With Hafner at third and two down, Buck roped a double off the wall in left to easily score Kearns and tie the game.

Game Notes

Since being activated from the disabled list on June 17, Hafner is hitting .304...The Indians are 15-13 against AL East competition, while the Jays are 15-11 against AL Central opponents...Tomlin went six frames, giving up four runs -- three earned -- on seven hits while Blue Jays starter Brandon Morrow worked eight innings, his longest outing of the season, yielding three runs on three hits.






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