Seattle Mariners first baseman Mike Carp has been on a tear game series.
Carp homered twice in Monday's 6-5 win over the Jays in the series opener from Safeco Field and extended his career-high hitting streak to 15 games. He has driven in 17 runs this month and has reached base safely in 24 straight games. Since being recalled from Triple-A Tacoma, Carp is hitting .371 with six homers and 26 runs batted in.
Casper Wells also homered and Trayvon Robinson finished with three hits, an RBI and a run scored for the Mariners, who have won three straight and eight of their last 13 contests.
"Our guys battled, never gave in to it," said Mariners manager Eric Wedge. "Obviously, Carp really stepped up for us, as did Wells there late, but I thought we had good at bats throughout."
Tom Wilhelmsen worked a scoreless eighth to earn his first major league victory. Brandon League allowed a two-out single in the ninth, but retired Jose Bautista on a groundout to record his 30th save of the season. Seattle starter Michael Pineda worked the first five innings and gave up five runs in the no-decision.
Taking the ball for Wedge's club tonight will be Jason Vargas, who ended a lengthy winless drought his last time out. Vargas was 0-5 in six starts -- all Seattle losses -- until a 4-3 win at Texas last Wednesday in which he allowed three runs in seven innings of work. The effort lifted Vargas' record to 7-10 in 24 starts and lowered his earned run average to 4.01.
Vargas, a left-hander, lost at Toronto on July 20 and is 0-1 with a 4.96 ERA in three career starts against the Blue Jays.
Toronto had a modest two-game winning streak stopped and lost for the fourth time in seven tries with last night's defeat.
Eric Thames and Adam Lind each hit a two-run homer and Brett Lawrie connected on a solo shot for the Jays. Henderson Alvarez did not figure into the decision and allowed four runs in five innings, while Jon Rauch was dealt the loss for permitting the go-ahead run and three hits in two-thirds of an inning.
"They did a good job of putting the bat on the ball and mistakes made with location cost us the two solos," said Blue Jays manager John Farrell.'
Edwin Encarnacion went 0-for-3 to have his hitting streak end at 13 games, while Yunel Escobar has reached base safely in 43 of his last 46 games.
The Blue Jays will visit Oakland for four games and hope starting pitcher Brad Mills can even this set in the Emerald City tonight. Mills is 1-2 with a 6.46 earned run average in three starts this season and lost to the Athletics in last Thursday's 10-3 setback. He allowed six runs and five hits in three innings of work.
"The key for me is to keep it down, and I didn't do it," said Mills. "When I'm down, I'm fine, and that's obviously the goal. Today, there were a lot of balls in the strike zone and up in the strike zone, and you saw the result of it."
Mills, a lefty, threw a scoreless inning of relief in a 1-0 win versus Seattle last September 23 at Rogers Centre.
Toronto had won four straight against the Mariners until losing last night.
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