After dodging trouble, Gausman spins a masterpiece

ST. PETERSBURG -- In his first 14 pitches Tuesday night, Blue Jays right-hander Kevin Gausman issued a leadoff walk and hit a batter.

“I got in a little trouble at first,’’ Gausman said.

After that, he authored a masterpiece.

Gausman allowed just one hit over eight innings -- retiring 22 of his last 23 batters -- and led the Blue Jays past the Tampa Bay Rays, 3-1, at Tropicana Field.

Gausman (8-8), who allowed a season-high five runs over 4 2/3 innings in his last start, took a no-hitter into the sixth inning, when Rays shortstop Taylor Walls led off with a single to right field. Walls also got Tampa Bay's only other hit, a ninth-inning home run off closer Jordan Romano, to spoil the shutout.

“He located his heater and he was nasty,’’ Blue Jays interim manager John Schneider said of Gausman. “When he puts it where he wants to in the zone, he’s really, really tough to hit. He was just basically dominant.’’

Toronto (58-45), which is 13 games over .500 for the first time all season, has won 13 of its last 16 games after coming out of a 1-9 stretch. After bolstering their bullpen by acquiring relievers Zach Pop and Anthony Bass, and then trading for All-Star Whit Merrifield before defeating their American League East rivals on the road, the Blue Jays enjoyed a pretty good day.

Gausman made certain of that by registering his longest scoreless outing since Aug. 21, 2018, while hitting double-digit strikeouts (10) for the fourth time this season.

“I felt like I could kind of put the ball where I wanted to,’’ Gausman said. “You definitely know [there’s a no-hitter]. It was unfortunate that I wasn’t able to do it. But it just shows you how hard it is to do at the Major League level and why there’s not many of them.

“We did a good job coming back after that [Walls’ sixth-inning single] and getting a ground ball [for a double play] and not letting them gain momentum.’’

Gausman’s performance certainly got the attention of the Rays’ clubhouse.

“He established his fastball maybe a little bit more than what we’ve seen,’’ Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “I’m going to always give credit to the pitcher that throws a no-hitter [through five innings]. I’d like to think we could do a better job of making in-game adjustments. But Gausman was really, really good.’’

Meanwhile, Rays starter Drew Rasmussen called Gausman “one of the game’s best pitchers’’ and praised the command of his splitter and four-seam fastball, which he described as “plus-plus pitches.’’

Gausman got all the support he needed in the first inning. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. slammed a hit to the left-center-field gap and legged out a double, extending his hitting streak to 13 games. He went to third on an Alejandro Kirk groundout, then scored on Bo Bichette’s single.

It remained a one-run game in the ninth, when the Rays were one out away from escaping a jam. But Danny Jansen’s bloop to center field just eluded the diving Jose Siri, popping out of his glove and rolling away for a two-run single that gave the Blue Jays what would be a needed cushion.

Schneider said it was an easy decision to lift Gausman (103 pitches) after the eighth and go to Romano because Gausman had “emptied his tank’’ in the eighth.

By the time the game had ended, after an extremely busy few hours, Schneider was ready to exhale.

“Just because it's a Deadline and you kind of know what you got is what you got, I guess,’’ Schneider said. “But like I said, man, we're confident. We liked the team. We just made it a little bit better. We're excited moving forward with the additions we made. I think it's nothing but good when you surround a really good team with more really good players.’’