TORONTO -- Managing a pitching staff is a game of strategy, and the Giants were playing 3D chess on Tuesday night.

San Francisco didn’t simply play the matchups in its 3-0 win over the Blue Jays at Rogers Centre. It effectively balanced leverage and workload in another successful bullpen game, keeping a dangerous lineup in check en route to a road shutout.

“When we can all work together like that and be on our A game, we're unstoppable,” said Ryan Walker. “It's really fun to see everyone be on their A game and pick up everybody.”

It took Walker a couple of at-bats to find his A game, but he got there unscathed. The right-hander made his third appearance in as many games, slotting in as the opener for the fifth time this season to face the Blue Jays’ righty-heavy top of the order ahead of Alex Wood.

Walker worked around a game-opening double and a single to strike out the next three batters and hand over a clean scoresheet to Wood in the second inning.

That’s when the bounce-back began.

Coming off a six-run start against the D-backs in which he didn’t make it out of the fourth inning, Wood retrieved his form behind the opener. The lefty struck out seven Blue Jays hitters over five-plus innings, allowing just five hits with no walks on 80 pitches (54 strikes).

“We’re playing really good baseball right now,” said Wood. “I felt really great tonight, I felt my stuff was really good. It’s definitely something to build on, just excited to get back out there in five days.”

After that clunker against Arizona, Wood stated that he needed to find a way to throw strikes more consistently. He did so by working on his posture between starts, focusing on staying more upright a bit longer in his delivery.

His success was plain to see on a walk column flashing zero, as it did for all four pitchers the Giants deployed.

“I’ve never walked people in my whole career,” said Wood. “Good, bad, indifferent, that’s always been a super consistent part of my game. … So that’s been a little out of character for me up to this point. I felt like we figured something out in between, and hopefully … it holds moving forward.”

The Giants didn’t blow the game open until the ninth inning, carrying a one-run lead after Patrick Bailey’s RBI double in the fifth. As a result, manager Gabe Kapler had to turn to his high-leverage arms for all of this one -- including 1 2/3 frames from Tyler Rogers and a four-out save by Camilo Doval.

“You get into the middle innings and now you're able to get a lead, you have to protect that lead,” said Kapler. “Sometimes even at the expense of working guys a little bit more than you might other ones. If you're trying to go for the win in a situation like this, you just might have to be a little bit more flexible in the subsequent games.”

By giving Wood the bulk of the action Tuesday, San Francisco may have opened an avenue for former Blue Jay Ross Stripling to make a lengthier appearance in the series finale on Thursday. Stripling has yet to see action after being activated off the injured list on Sunday, and he’s expected to be eased back in as a long-relief arm.

That’s a good puzzle to solve after a big win in which Giants pitchers struck out 17 batters and limited their opponents to a 1-for-12 mark with runners in scoring position.

“Weird looks,” said Blue Jays manager John Schneider of San Francisco’s pitching. “From the opener to Rogers and then [Doval’s] 100 mph that cuts. Weird looks. This is how they’re built. We knew that going in.”

The Giants needed all the schemes and calculations in the series opener, as Kevin Gausman pitched like he had something to prove in his first start against his former team.

Gausman didn’t allow a hit until the fifth inning, striking out 12 batters over six frames to further a campaign that has him in American League Cy Young Award conversations this season. Thairo Estrada broke up the no-hit bid with a one-out single, then he stole second and took third on a balk ahead of Bailey’s double.

Estrada added a pair of ninth-inning insurance runs for San Francisco, sending a laser to left field for an RBI double that gave Doval some breathing room on his way to three strikeouts and four outs for the save.