Detroit ― The Detroit Tigers broke out a new home-run celebration early Thursday night, but it was the same old stuck-in-the-mud offense that led to the once-upon-a-time best team in baseball’s latest defeat.

The Blue Jays got to Reese Olson for five runs in the sixth inning and to Dietrich Enns for four more in the seventh in blowing out the Tigers, 11-4, before a large and relatively split crowd on a sweltering night at Comerica Park.

The loss was the Tigers’ 10th in their last 11 games, the latest after having a first-inning lead on a home run by Jahmai Jones. Detroit, whose lead in the American League Central has been cut from 14 games to eight over Cleveland in the last couple weeks, has won just one game since July 8.

“We obviously have 100% belief in ourselves still. You know, we’re a good team,” Olson said after the game, in a stone-cold-silent clubhouse. “Up until the All-Star break, we were the best team in baseball.

“We believe that’s who we are ― a good team.”

The record (60-44) suggests as much, even if this long skid raises plenty of questions.

The Tigers had just four more hits through eight innings after the home run Thursday, despite facing a left-hander in Eric Lauer (6-2). The Tigers have typically feasted on lefty pitching this season.

All of the four other hits off Lauer were singles, two by Dillon Dingler, and one gifted to Javier Báez in the eighth inning when Blue Jays second baseman Leo Jimenez and first baseman Will Wagner collided on a high pop-up that fell fair.

By the time the Tigers got back on the scoreboard the game was long gone.

“You know, it’s been 11 days, but it feels like it’s been a lot longer, and I think maybe that’s because of the (All-Star) break,” Tigers manager AJ Hinch said of the skid. “A lot of it is just the way that baseball is, you know.

“We can choose to bring that garbage into tomorrow, or we can, you know reset and get back after it.

“I know this team, I know the conversation around it over the last couple weeks.

“We’ve got to piece it back together.”

Hinch was speaking mostly about the offense, which did next to nothing until it was far too late in the series opener against the Blue Jays.

And that all put the onus on Olson (4-4), who was dynamite through the first five innings, attacking the Blue Jays’ dangerous lineup. But the Blue Jays ― who came in as the hottest team in baseball, facing the coldest ― could only be kept quiet for so long. Olson got the first out in the fifth inning, and then the floodgates opened, with Vladimir Guerrero’s double down the line in left field scoring the first run.

Four batters later, it was 5-1, after back-to-back homers by Ernie Clement (396 feet, off a slider Olson called a “terrible” pitch) and Joey Loperfido (394 feet, 197.2 mph off the bat, on a change-up).

Olson’s last batter was a hit batter, which had hopping out of the dugout so fast, you’d think his hair was on fire (and on this scorching night, who’s to say it wasn’t?). Enns got the last out of the sixth, but the seventh was a struggle.

Olson’s sixth inning started with a one-out walk by Olson, typically a killer, Hinch said.

BOX SCORE: Blue Jays 11, Tigers 4

“It always seems like a walk is going to hurt you,” said Hinch, who in the sixth inning also decided to intentionally walk Addison Barger (who had stung the ball his first two at-bats off Olson) before Clement hit his home run. Olson, for the record, trusts Hinch’s decisions.

“Then, in the span of 20 minutes, they scored like nine or 11 runs. They just took it to us.”

In the seventh, Guerrero added an RBI on a single, and Barger added a two-run triple. Barger then scored on Clement’s sacrifice fly (he had four RBIs) to make it 9-1.

Lukes made it 11-1 with a two-run homer in the eighth inning off the newest Tigers reliever, Geoff Hartlieb, who was called up before the game to replace the DFA’d Carlos Hernandez. Lukes’ blast went 420 feet, on a slider.

It got so bad, many in the crowd of 30,051 (Tigers great Willie Horton, wearing a No. 23 City Connect jersey, among them) were gone long before “Don’t Stop Believin'” began playing before the bottom of the eighth, despite it being the Tigers’ first home game since July 31.

Late in the Tigers’ broadcast, cameras spent much a half-inning showing a squirrel on the field. The Tigers probably wish their fans would find a distraction right about now.

Of course, many of those fans missed the best entertainment of the night, Tigers catcher Jake Rogers pitching the ninth inning. With his array of mostly 50- and 60-mph offerings (and some dandy knuckleballs), he allowed a pair of hits, but no runs. Rogers’ last pitch of the inning was 81 mph. That was Rogers’ third pitching appearance of the season, and fourth of his career. It actually was his second scoreless outing in a row.

On the other side, Lauer was nearly flawless for the Blue Jays after Jones’ home run in the first (Jones’ fourth this season, a 399-footer to left). He went eight innings, striking out six. Of his 97 pitches, 71 were strikes.

HIGHLIGHTS FROM BLUE JAYS-TIGERS GAME

“He doesn’t seem to make a ton of mistakes,” Hinch said. “I hesitate to call him ‘crafty,’ because I don’t want to come across as not a compliment. But it is, you know. He disrupts timing.”

The Tigers did finally get to Blue Jays reliever (and former Tigers prospect) Chad Green in the bottom of the ninth, on Spencer Torkelson’s 22nd homer of the season (a 399-foot shot to left), followed by an RBI groundout by Wenceel Perez and RBI single by Colt Keith.

But in the first meeting when the Tigers and Blue Jays have both been in first place since 1987, it was mostly the Blue Jays looked the part, in winning for the 19th time in the last 24 games.

The Tigers, well, they flunked the screen test. Their team ERA over the last 11 games is approaching 7.00.

Friday night is Game 2 of the four-game series, which Hinch said earlier Thursday would be “fun.” Outside of a new home-run dugout celebration, there was a dearth of fun for the Tigers.

Hey, so, what else is new.

“You just try your hardest not to try to do too much, because that’s when you start making mental mistakes,” Dingler said. “Obviously, with each one, you know, some people might feel you sink a little bit deeper, but our morale is still good. You wouldn’t feel, as an outsider, you wouldn’t suspect that. We’re dealing with it.

“We’re going to go out there tomorrow and we’re gonna string together some hits and try to get back on the horse.”

tpaul@detroitnews.com

@tonypaul1984