{"id":797836,"date":"2026-09-06T05:00:19","date_gmt":"2026-09-06T05:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/797836\/"},"modified":"2026-09-06T05:00:19","modified_gmt":"2026-09-06T05:00:19","slug":"blue-jays-top-royals-to-pull-into-tie-for-final-al-playoff-spot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/797836\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue Jays top Royals to pull into tie for final AL playoff spot"},"content":{"rendered":"

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) Kazuma Okamoto had four hits and two RBIs, including a tiebreaking single in the seventh inning, as the surging Toronto Blue Jays<\/a> beat the Kansas City Royals<\/a> 4-3 on Saturday night to pull even with Cleveland for the final American League playoff spot.<\/p>\n

Toronto (72-71) won for the seventh time in eight games and moved over .500 for the first time since the Blue Jays were 4-3 on April 3. The defending AL champions, who were 10 games under .500 on July 28, are tied with the Guardians for the league’s third wild card.<\/p>\n

Okamoto went 4 for 5 with a double and broke a 3-all tie in the seventh with an RBI single. In the third inning, Okamoto hit an RBI double that hit third base over a diving Josh Rojas and rolled into the left-field corner.<\/p>\n

Nathan Lukes had three hits for Toronto, including an RBI single that made it 2-0 in the first. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. scored the first run of the game from first base when Alejandro Kirk reached on a two-out infield single and Rojas committed a throwing error.<\/p>\n

Blue Jays starter Max Scherzer pitched 5 2\/3 innings, giving up three runs and five hits with two strikeouts and a walk. Mason Fluharty (6-1) worked a hitless inning in relief and Louis Varland got three outs for his 33rd save.<\/p>\n

Seth Lugo allowed three runs and eight hits in five innings for Kansas City. Craig Kimbrel (1-3) took the loss.<\/p>\n

John Rave hit a solo homer for the Royals that tied it 3-all in the fourth. Jac Caglianone and Salvador Perez each had an RBI single in the first to pull Kansas City even at 2.<\/p>\n

Caglianone exited in the third with left elbow soreness.<\/p>\n

The Royals had runners at first and second with no outs down 4-3 in the eighth, but couldn\u2019t capitalize when Vinnie Pasquantino grounded into a double play and Michael Massy grounded out.<\/p>\n

Kansas City is 18-8 in its last 26 games at Kauffman Stadium.<\/p>\n

Royals RHP Randy Dobnak (2-3, 2.65 ERA) will pitch the series finale Sunday. Toronto had not announced a scheduled starter.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

See AP\u2019s full MLB coverage here<\/p>\n

\n Copyright 2026 STATS LLC and Associated Press. Any commercial use or distribution without the express written consent of STATS LLC and Associated Press is strictly prohibited.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) Kazuma Okamoto had four hits and two RBIs, including a tiebreaking single in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":794230,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2288],"tags":[5,55,2328,2304,4,2305,2303,70],"class_list":["post-797836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb-postseason","tag-baseball","tag-kansas-city-royals","tag-major-league-baseball-playoffs","tag-major-league-baseball-postseason","tag-mlb","tag-mlb-playoffs","tag-mlb-postseason","tag-toronto-blue-jays"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/117222337636678168","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=797836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797836\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/794230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=797836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=797836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=797836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}