TORONTO - Adam Lind stroked two solo homers and starter Brandon Morrow was brilliant over eight innings as the Toronto Blue Jays defeated the New York Yankees 3-0 on Sunday.
It was a glorious afternoon for a late summer game and Lind gave the 34,657 fans at Rogers Centre plenty to cheer about with his third multi-homer effort of the season. Both blasts came off Yankees starter Freddy Garcia (11-8), who lasted four-plus innings.
Morrow, who improved to 10-11, allowed four hits and had eight strikeouts. He walked a batter and threw 78 of his 107 pitches for strikes.
The 27-year-old right-hander has struggled of late, allowing 13 earned runs in his two previous outings and dropping six of his last seven decisions overall.
Frank Francisco gave up a double to Eduardo Nunez before recording his 16th save. Toronto improved to 77-75 by taking the rubber game of the three-game series.
New York leads the American League with a 91-60 record. The Yankees entered play 4 1/2 games up on second-place Boston in the American League East. The Red Sox played the Tampa Bay Rays on Sunday.
Lind opened the scoring in the bottom of the second inning. He doubled Toronto's lead in the fourth with his 26th homer of the season.
Eric Thames, who made two nice catches in left field earlier in the game, made it 3-0 in the fifth inning with a sacrifice fly to deep centre that scored J.P. Arencibia.
Yankees manager Joe Girardi prevented Lind from getting a third crack at Garcia later in the frame. He brought in Aaron Laffey but the southpaw reliever walked Lind to load the bases.
Girardi went right back to the bullpen and right-hander Luis Ayala got Edwin Encarnacion to fly out to end the threat.
Thames had to leave the game in the seventh inning after he fouled a pitch off his own head. He was jammed on the swing and the ball caught him near the left temple, sending his helmet flying off.
Thames was smiling after the strange incident but was still taken out of the game. The Jays loaded the bases but Encarnacion grounded out to strand three runners for the second straight at-bat.
Toronto outhit New York 7-5 and the game took two hours 45 minutes to play.
Notes: Lind has seven career multi-homer games. ... The Yankees will return home to play a makeup game against Minnesota on Monday stemming from a rainout on April 6. ... The Blue Jays will begin their final home series of the season Monday against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. Jays ace Ricky Romero (15-10) is scheduled to start against Jerome Williams (3-0). ... Toronto will visit Tampa Bay next weekend before closing out the regular season in Chicago.
