Flaws and all, no-quit Blue Jays persevere for wild win over World Series champs

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September is still a ways off, as is baseball’s most important month, October. But we’re deep enough in the season to see them both.

And with that in mind, the mere prospect of what the Blue Jays bats did late on what turned to be a spellbinding late Sunday afternoon at Dodger Stadium has to be cause for some salivation for this never-quit group.

It was a 5-4 Blue Jays win, loaded with flaws as it was, that in the end was defined by the grit and perseverance that has propelled the team to what is now a 69-50 record.

That it concluded with yet an unlikely hero in a season loaded with them  — a pitcher saving the day against one of the greatest hitters of all time — only added to the magnificence of the moment for the Jays, who avoided a sweep at the hand of the World Series champs.

That would be reliever Mason Fluharty, who came on in the ninth inning with the bases loaded and one out for the biggest two outs of his young career. First up was a money strikeout of Shohei Ohtani — who swung over top of an 83-mph sweeper on a 3-2 pitch — followed by a ground-ball out by Mookie Betts to end it.

It served up an emotional celebration for the Jays and assuredly a festive long flight home from the West Coast for a team that must be starting to believe something special is happening.

But back to the late-game highlights and heroics after the Jays seemed headed for a third consecutive meek defeat, one which would have been one of the more demoralizing losses of the season.

First it was Vlad Guerrero Jr. with his now team-leading 19th homer of the season to tied the game in the eighth inning followed by Addison Barger, the next man to the plate, with his 18th to give the Jays the lead.

After the Jays allowed the Dodgers to get back square in the bottom half, Ernie Clement took the first pitch he faced in the ninth and knocked it into the seats for what turned out to be the game-winning homer.

The 5-4 victory, in a game that by the end was thick with a playoff feel, was an extra large one for the Jays on a number of fronts. Not so fast though, as closer Jeff Hoffman, showing the rust of not having pitched in a week, walked in the equalizer in the eighth. It would have been easy for the Jays to go quietly after that, but that would be against the DNA of this group.

In many ways, the win will feel like one of the most important of the season for the Jays.

Let’s start with the fact that it avoided a sweep at the hands of the World Series champs, a verdict that seemed certain through the first 25 innings of the weekend series, a stretch in which the visitors had managed just four runs.

Then there’s the fact that even though they lost the series 2-1 to the Dodgers, trouncing the Colorado Rockies over three games last week made it a 4-2 road trip, an important statement given they were 2-6 in their previous eight contests.

With the Boston Red Sox losing to the Padres a two-hour drive south in San Diego, it allowed the Jays to increase their lead in the AL East to four games over the Sox and a whopping 6.5 over the reeling New York Yankees.

The biggest takeaway of hope, however, may have been the timely bomb unleashed by Guerrero, seemingly a moment the Jays and their fans have been waiting for since he signed his $500-million US contract extension in the spring.

While Guerrero has been producing — and of late has been heating up — moments like Sunday’s rally starter were what is expected of him. It’s easy to dream on this team having success if and when Guerrero can deliver in critical phases such as that one.

The victory, as stressful as it was, can’t mask some of the flaws the Jays have endured of late, especially on the pitching side. They’ve given up far too many homers — two in the first inning from starter Eric Lauer on Sunday the latest — and a whopping 13 walks in this wild game.

But finding ways to win against a tough opponent in an electric environment will help ease that sting. And add another jolt of confidence to a team already feeling it.

BULLPEN BRILLIANCE

In the first true wobble of an outing by Jays starter Lauer, who lasted just three innings, the bullpen came up huge for manager John Schneider and pitching coach Pete Walker.

It started with Louis Varland, who kept the Dodgers off the board through 1.2 innings before Brayden Fisher finished off the fifth frame. Scoreless appearances from Seranthony Dominguez, Brendon Little and Yariel Rodriguez followed.

It got rather challenging from there, shall we say, as closer Hoffman, inheriting two base-runners from Rodiguez, issued back-to-back walks in the eighth to tie it 4-4, and then walked the first Dodgers batter of the ninth, Andy Pages. After Hoffman had loaded the bases again, Schneider had seen enough and it was on to the lefty Fluharty for his unlikely, but mightily impressive, heroics.

BYE GEORGE?

It’s certainly no coincidence that the Jays’ offensive struggles are related to the now extended absence of one of the heartbeats of the team’s offence this season, George Springer.

The effects of the veteran’s concussion, sustained in Baltimore on July 29, continue to confound the team. He has yet to appear in a minor-league rehab game as he continues to be unable to pass concussion protocols.

The Jays had hoped that Springer would have been able to play for the Buffalo Bisons over the weekend but wasn’t cleared to enter the lineup for any of the team’s three games. With no triple-A games on Monday, the next opportunity for Springer to see any minor-league action is Tuesday.