Buckle up for a Blue Jays wild (card) ride that will likely extend until final weekend of season

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Uncommon can be the Blue Jays participant that gained’t be locked into some critical scoreboard-watching over the following 10 days.

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How may they not?

It begins with what they do within the remaining three video games in Minneapolis, but it surely additionally begs the query of simply who the Jays needs to be rooting for in a three-game weekend collection between the Yankees and Purple Sox at Boston’s Fenway Park.

All three groups are placing the wild within the wild-card race, a touch that also has important potential to increase to the ultimate weekend and presumably past.

The Jays started Friday’s play on the skin of the American League playoff race trying in. This, in fact, was a self-inflicted wound after dropping three of 4 heading into the second of a four-game collection towards the Twins at Goal Subject in Minneapolis, the ultimate three which instantly had been laden in significance.

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What shouldn’t have been an excessively onerous task towards the AL Central basement boys grew notably extra stout with Thursday’s 7-2 loss down within the Twin Cities.

With three video games every remaining towards the Twins, Yanks snd Orioles, the Jays are prone to want six wins (and 7 if we stick with our season-long tout that it’s going to take 92 to make it to the post-season). And it’s doable which may not be sufficient.

That leaves next-to-no margin for error for the rest of the weekend within the Land of 10,000 Lakes.

Complicating issues is that three-game collection in Boston involving the 2 groups they’re chasing for the pair of wild-card spots.

So from that scoreboard-watching perspective, who’re the Jays to cheer for?

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With loads of balls nonetheless in play and the potential for eventualities to get difficult, it wouldn’t be the worst from supervisor Charlie Montoyo’s crew if the Purple Sox swept the Yankees — as unlikely as that appeared, particularly after the Bronx Bombers roared out to an early 6-0 lead on Friday.

Boston operating away with issues seemingly take a wild-card date on the Rogers Centre out of the equation, however it will give the Jays the higher hand (or a minimum of management of their future) ought to they have the ability to deal with enterprise towards the Yankees.

And the Jays’ position is simply a part of the drama.

With three collection remaining for every of the combatants, issues may get extraordinarily convoluted over the ultimate two weekends of the common season. Ought to the Jays, Yanks and Sox finish the season in a three-way tie, 4 instance, it will arrange three days of the wildest wild-card motion you would dream up.

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Including to the intrigue is the difficult — and gruelling — tie-breaking mechanism ought to all three AL East rivals end the 162-game season with equal information.

In accordance with MLB, if the Jays, Yankees and Purple Sox are all tied, the three groups would obtain (or within the case of the crew with the perfect head-to-head information, select) A, B and C designations. Membership A would host Membership B and the winner of that contest would declare one wild-card spot whereas the loser would then face Membership C on the street to find out the opposite.

The winner of these two video games would face one another within the precise wild-card sport. In different phrases, a crew may play video games on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, all within the wild card contest.

So what about these designations? They’ll be decided by head-to-head information and since the Purple Sox will end the season with the higher mark towards each rivals, they’ll choose first.

Primarily based on profitable their season collection towards the Yankees (they lead 10-6 with three video games remaining) the Jays would choose second.

Ideally, will probably be so simple as two groups claiming spots and the Jays most reasonable possibility at this level can be to face the Purple Sox at Fenway on Oct. 5 in a one-game showdown to maneuver on to an AL Divisonal collection.

So buckle up. Loads of agua to move beneath the bridge between from time to time.