ARLINGTON, Texas – Drew Hutchison outdueled Yu Darvish and Melky Cabrera hit a two-run double in the eighth inning to lift the Toronto Blue Jays to a 2-0 win over the Texas Rangers on Friday night.
Cabrera’s liner sailed just beyond the outstretched glove of Texas first baseman Mitch Moreland, scoring Erik Kratz and Anthony Gose.
Hutchison (2-3) shut out Texas on three singles in his first career complete game, earning his first victory since his first start of the season on April 1. He struck out six.
Kratz and Gose each reached against Darvish (3-2) on infield bunts. The right-handed hitting Kratz bunted to third and beat an off-balance throw by Adrian Beltre. Gose, a left-handed hitter, drag bunted up the first-base line. Moreland’s throw to second baseman Rougned Odor covering first base wasn’t in time.
Darvish went eight innings, allowing two runs on five hits. He struck out 11 and walked three in his first start since throwing a one-hitter against Boston last Friday that Major League Baseball on Wednesday ruled was a two-hitter.
Neither team got a runner beyond first base until the sixth inning — thanks in part to a successful Toronto challenge in the third inning that reversed a safe call on a steal of second base by Leonys Martin. In the bottom of the sixth, Martin walked, was bunted to second, advanced to third on a sacrifice fly. He was stranded when Elvis Andrus grounded to shortstop.
Darvish was working on six days’ rest because of a shuffling of the Rangers’ starting rotation when Martin Perez experienced elbow pain in his start Saturday.
The first hit off Darvish came in the fifth inning, a leadoff single pulled to right field by Adam Lind.
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