Daulton Varsho’s booming bat rescues Blue Jays offence again

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At a power-packed 5-foot-8 is Daulton Varsho strong enough to carry the Blue Jays offence?

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In these desperate times for the Toronto offence, some days it sure feels like it.

One of those days was Monday in Texas, when the Jays were in desperate need of flashing some form of attack to support the brilliance of starter Kevin Gausman. Varsho, the best offensive story for the Jays so far in this uneven season, was the man again, leading the Jays to a narrow 2-1 win over the Rangers in Arlington, Tex.

In fact, it was pretty much a solo effort offensively from the bat of Varsho, who belted his team-leading eighth home run of the season off Rangers ace Jacob deGrom in the first inning — a rare early run for the offensively challenged Jays.

The all-world centre fielder then added a big double in his next at-bat in the third leading, setting up the Jays second (and final) run of the game on a sacrifice fly from Alejandro Kirk. With Gausman stellar for a second consecutive start, it would be all the Jays would need in a big exhale of a win in the first of three in the Texas leg of their six-game road trip.

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There wasn’t much memorable about the U.S. Memorial Day win, but snapping a three-game losing streak had to feel significant to manager John Schneider’s team, which improved to 26-27 and can at least exhale.

After being humiliated with an embarrassing offensive output in Tampa on the weekend — in which they were outscored 19-2 by the Rays in that miserable three-game sweep — the Jays needed to bounce back in a bad way.

Facing a struggling Rangers team — losers of six of their previous seven — proved to be the answer as the sleepy Jays offence remained mostly in hibernation mode facing the stout test of Rangers starter Jacob deGrom.

They’ll take the win, of course, but leaving two runners on in the fourth, fifth, sixth and eighth innings allowed the Rangers to remain in the game and further accentuated their struggles at the plate.

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For Varsho then, home run No. 8 of the season was massive. It not only gave him the team the early lead, but it continued his torrid power pace since returning after missing the first month and change of the season.

Lined into the right-field corner, it was a rare first-inning score for a Jays team that had scored just 16 in the opening frame of the first 52 games of the season. Varsho made it a three-hit afternoon with a leadoff bunt single in the ninth.

The task doesn’t get much easier for the Jays on Tuesday when righty Nathan Eovaldi and his skimpy 1.60 ERA takes the mound for the Rangers, who face Toronto righty Bowden Francis, who with a 2-6 record and 5.54 ERA has struggled much of the season.

GAUSMAN GOLD

In going seven shutout innings, Gausman was brilliant for a second consecutive start, allowing five hits over a stellar eight innings of work.

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Gausman’s splitter was money for a second consecutive start, stymieing Rangers hitters with its nasty downward break all game long. He was in the zone throughout, dealing 72 strikes from his 96 innings.

Gausman, who has not walked a batter since May 3 pitched eight complete for the second time this season.

Another source of relief came from ace reliever — closer Jeff Hoffman, who had struggled lately. Hoffman served up a 1-2-3 ninth to earn his 11th save of the season.

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NOT MUCH DOING

Though the Jays could only manage two runs off of deGrom, they were able to put together a number of decent at-bats in a rare day where the veteran righty wasn’t blowing batters away. Consider that in the betting world, the over/under on strikeouts by the Rangers starter was 6.5 for the game and he didn’t manage one against the Jays, a career first for the veteran in 229 big league starts.

Though deGrom didn’t give up much, the Jays chased him from the game after 5.1 innings in which he allowed five hits and a pair of walks.

The biggest damage came off of Varsho’s bat after he left a hanging slider over the plate that the Jays No. 3 hitter feasted on.

For perspective, deGrom had allowed just one run in 19 innings over his three previous starts.

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