Kevin Gausman allowed two runs in six innings and was supported by 14 hits as the Toronto Blue Jays defeated the visiting Baltimore Orioles 8-2 on Friday night.
Gausman (1-0) yielded three hits and one walk while striking out four to help give Toronto a split of the first two contests of a four-game, season-opening series.
Down 2-0 early, the Blue Jays scored five runs in the fourth inning to pull away for good.
Jackson Holliday hit a solo home run for Baltimore.
Orioles starter Charlie Morton (0-1) escaped a first-inning jam when he struck out the final two batters with runners at the corners.
Baltimore did not have a runner reach base until Holliday touched them all after he tagged a fastball over the center field wall with one out in the third.
Toronto squandered one-out doubles in the second and third innings.
Adley Rutschman walked to lead off the Orioles’ fourth, took third on Ryan O’Hearn’s single and slid home on Tyler O’Neill’s moderate fly to left.
Toronto loaded the bases with no outs in the bottom of the fourth on singles by Alejandro Kirk, George Springer and Will Wagner. A run scored when Nathan Lukes walked. Alan Roden’s sacrifice fly to right tied the game at 2.
Albert Suarez replaced Morton, and his first offering was a run-scoring wild pitch. Bo Bichette singled to put runners at the corners before Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hit a sacrifice fly to center.
The Blue Jays scored another run when Anthony Santander grounded a single to right. Bichette reached third and on the hit and scored when shortstop Jorge Mateo’s relay throw skipped into the Baltimore dugout.
Morton was charged with four runs on seven hits and a walk in 3 1/3 innings. He fanned three.
Suarez allowed a run in the sixth on Lukes’ single, a wild pitch and Bichette’s single.
Toronto pinch hitter Ernie Clement’s two-run double in the seventh against Cionel Perez padded the lead.
Blue Jays reliever Brendon Little struck out the first two batters of the eighth and left with an apparent hand injury after the count reached 1-2 count on Colton Cowser. Nick Sandlin took over to complete the strikeout, and he subsequently pitched a scoreless ninth inning.
