TORONTO — Roy Halladay struck out a career-high 14 to win his major league-leading ninth game, Alex Rios backed him with a home run and the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Los Angeles Angels 6-4 on Tuesday night.
Halladay (9-1) threw his second complete game of the season, allowing four runs, no walks and seven hits to win his sixth straight decision. Working on an extra day of rest, he threw a season-high 133 pitches.
The right-hander, whose only defeat this season was an April 21 loss to Texas, moved ahead of Kansas City’s Zack Greinke for the major league lead in wins.
Halladay faced just one batter over the minimum through six innings but ran into trouble in the seventh, when Bobby Abreu and Vladimir Guerrero led off with singles. After Halladay loaded the bases with a four-pitch walk to Torii Hunter, Kendry Morales followed with an RBI single. Guerrero scored on a wild pitch before Maicer Izturis and Mike Napoli both hit sacrifice flies.
Jose Bautista gave Toronto a 1-0 lead with an RBI triple in the second, and the Blue Jays added two more in the third against Angels left-hander Joe Saunders (6-4). Rios led off with his seventh homer and, two outs later, Scott Rolen doubled and scored on Kevin Millar’s single.
The Blue Jays chased Saunders with a four-run sixth. Adam Lind singled, stole second and scored when Gary Matthews misplayed Scott Rolen’s sharp single to left, with Rolen taking second on the play. Millar hit an RBI double, took third on a wild pitch and scored on Rod Barajas’ single.
Rich Thompson came on for Saunders and walked Bautista, but got out of it when Marco Scutaro flied out and Aaron Hill struck out.
Saunders, who has lost three of his past four starts, allowed six runs and nine hits in 5 1-3 innings. He walked none and struck out four.
Scutaro was hitless in four at-bats, ending his streak of seven straight multi-hit games.
Notes: It was the seventh 10 strikeout game of Halladay’s career.
… Angels RHP Kelvim Escobar (shoulder) pitched five innings for Triple-A Salt Lake on Monday and will throw a bullpen in Toronto on Wednesday. If that goes well, Escobar will start for the Angels in Detroit on Saturday, his first appearance since 2007. … Blue Jays RHP Jesse Litsch (elbow), out since April 14, is still bothered by lingering soreness and made a second visit to Dr. James Andrews last week, manager Cito Gaston said. An MRI revealed no structural damage. … Toronto Raptors coach Jay Triano threw out the first pitch.
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