Bautista Bat Flips Into ALCS

(October 14, 2015- Tom Szczerbowski, Getty Images/North America)

In the playoffs, we've become accustomed to dramatic moments, dramatic games, dramatic sequences. None more than the Blue Jays vs. Texas Rangers game yesterday. With the Rangers taking the first two games in Toronto, the series seemed like it was totally one-sided. But Toronto bounced back and evened up the series and sending it to a win-or-go home Game 5 back at the Rogers Centre.

The Rangers sent playoff dominant lefty, Cole Hamels to the mound against Toronto's young righty, Marcus Stroman.

The Rangers were up 2-1 heading into the sixth when Edwin Encarnacion blasted a solo homer and did his trademark arm hang.
​

(October 14, 2015- Vaughn Ridley, Getty Images/North America)

That seemed to give Toronto with all the momentum in the world. Rogers Centre began to sound like Belle Centre (Home of the Montreal Canadiens), as chants of "Olé" began to ring in from the crowd.

However, jump ahead to the top half of the seventh. With Rangers second baseman, Roughned Odor at third, we saw one of the most bizarre plays in baseball postseason history.

Russell Martin receives the pitch and throws it back to the pitcher. Only it hits the bat of Shin Soo Choo and kicks towards the third baseman, and Odor comes flying home from third to score.

The play initiated an umpire conference where they awarded Odor the plate, giving Texas a 3-2 lead into the bottom of the seventh.

Hamels was back on the bump for the seventh. The defense was clearly not behind him however, as three consecutive errors were made by the Rangers (Elvis Andrus, Mitch Moreland, and Andrus again) to load the bases for the top of the Jays' order.

Ben Revere struck out to leave them loaded with one out for MVP candidate, Josh Donaldson. While it wasn't an error on the score card, Donaldson's blooper should've been caught, but it was a bloop single over second base. One run scored and there was a force at second, making it 3-3 with two outs for Jose Bautista.

And Bautista didn't disappoint the Toronto faithful.

Not only did Joey Bats hit a homer, he launched it. And not only did he launch it, he did a bat javelin toss. I mean, the bat went about 15 feet as he fired it in the air.

This led to more beer cans and debris being thrown into the turf, delaying the game. Encarnacion, afterwards, tried to calm down the crowd, which was misleading to Rangers pitcher, Sam Dyson, who thought Edwin Encarnacion was trying to get the crowd to be even louder.

The benches cleared.

Toronto went on to win the game, and the series, as Roberto Osuna slammed the door with a 5-out save.

The Blue Jays take on the Kansas City Royals on Friday night at 7:30 PM ET.

Jordan Leandre
@Jordan_BBS