Guerrero leads Blue Jays past Rays 5-1

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. had a solo homer in the first inning and later added an RBI as the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Tampa Bay Rays 5-1 on Wednesday.

TORONTO – Vladimir Guerrero Jr. had a solo homer in the first inning and later added an RBI as the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Tampa Bay Rays 5-1 on Wednesday.

It was the 100th home run of Guerrero’s career and he celebrated by drawing out the numerals with his fingers in the Blue Jays’ dugout.

Bo Bichette, Santiago Espinal and Raimel Tapia all had RBI singles as the Blue Jays (81-62) added to their lead over the Rays in the tight American League wild-card race.

Toronto now has a 1 1/2 game lead over Tampa Bay and a half-game over the Seattle Mariners, who beat the San Diego Padres 6-1 earlier Wednesday.

Ross Stripling (8-4) earned a quality start and the win, going 6 1/3 innings, allowing just one run on three hits and striking out four.

Relievers Adam Cimber, Yimi Garcia, and Anthony Bass closed the door the rest of the way.

Harold Ramirez’s home run was all the offence Tampa Bay (79-63) would get.

Drew Rasmussen (10-5) gave up four runs in as many innings on six hits and a walk. He struck out one. Josh Fleming allowed one run on five hits over his four innings of work.