PHILADELPHIA — John Buck, Aaron
Hill and Alex Gonzalez homered to lead the Toronto Blue Jays to a 5-1
win over the Philadelphia Phillies on Saturday.
Shaun Marcum (7-3) pitched six solid
innings, allowing one run and five hits while striking out six and
walking one. The right-hander improved to 7-1 in nine starts following a
Blue Jays defeat, the latest victory coming on the heels of Friday
night's 9-0 loss to the Phillies and former Toronto ace Roy Halladay.
The game was the second in a series
that was moved from Toronto to Philadelphia because of the G20 Summit.
The Blue Jays wore their home, alternate black uniforms and batted
second, while the Phillies wore their road grays.
Ryan Howard homered for the Phillies,
who had won four straight and scored 28 runs in their previous three
games. The Blue Jays had lost four of five.
In relief of Marcum, Scott Downs
pitched two hitless innings and Shawn Camp worked a hitless ninth as the
Phillies failed to get a hit in their last five innings.
Philadelphia left-hander Cole Hamels
(6-6) had one of his worst outings of the season, allowing five runs and
six hits in four innings. Hamels hadn't given up more than three earned
runs in nine straight starts. He pitched less than five innings only
one other time, a June 1 start at Atlanta that was halted after
two-thirds of an inning due to a rain delay.
The Blue Jays entered batting a major
league-worst .201 against lefties, but had no problems with Hamels.
After Lyle Overbay singled, Buck
homered to left to stake Toronto to a 2-0 second-inning lead. The Blue
Jays tacked on a run in the next inning on Hill's two-out homer to left
and added two more with Gonzalez's two-run shot in the fourth, also to
left. Buck leads major league catchers with 13 homers.
Hill and Gonzalez had been 3 for 26
and 4 for 27, respectively, prior to their home runs.
Toronto upped its major
league-leading home run total to 114.
Howard's sixth-inning homer provided
all the offense for Philadelphia. He improved to 2 for 3 with a pair of
home runs against Marcum.
NOTES: Philadelphia OF Jayson Werth
went 0 for 3 with three strikeouts and is 0 for 4 with four Ks lifetime
against Marcum. Phillies OF Shane Victorino has four hits in his last 29
at-bats. Despite the appearance of hundreds of empty seats, the
Phillies announced a sellout crowd of 44,426.