Music: {allcanada} Blue Jays come alive in 9th to rout Marlins

MIAMI -- Pitchers are going to make mistakes, and Brett Cecil has come to accept that.

His one major mistake Saturday afternoon was on a seventh inning changeup to Omar Infante that was meant to be away but ended up middle-in, and was quickly turned into an RBI double that surrendered the 1-0 lead he had fought so valiantly to protect, putting an end to his outing.

"I've learned very heavily that things like that are going to happen," Cecil explained afterwards, "you're going to regret throwing a couple of pitches, and hopefully you regret the pitch that leads to one run, not a three-run homer or something like that."

Despite the one blip, Cecil did exactly that in a duel with Miami Marlins ace Josh Johnson, and things ended well for the Toronto Blue Jays when Edwin Encarnacion's 21st home run to open the ninth keyed a sixth-run outburst that was capped by Colby Rasmus's grand slam in a 7-1 victory.

Nursing a 1-0 lead through six strong innings, Cecil would have been removed from the game had his spot in the order come up in the seventh. When it didn't, he had earned enough faith from manager John Farrell to start another inning despite approaching his best before point, and was undone by Justin Regianno's clever bunt single and his mistake changeup to Infante.

"It was getting to that (expiration) point for sure, that's why we had (Jason) Frasor going when the inning started, and we were set to pinch-hit if his spot in the order came up," explained Farrell. "But the fact remains he had given up three hits at the time and had the game under control … in my mind he more than earned the right to go back out there for the seventh."

A crucial bit of relief work from Frasor left Infante stranded at third to end the seventh tied 1-1 and the offence, like it has so often of late, proceeded to come through.

Encarnacion, playing despite sore left triceps from being hit on the left arm Friday, turned on a 1-2 offering to break the tie in the ninth, Jeff Mathis's safety squeeze added some more breathing room while Rasmus cracked things open later in the frame, preventing the Blue Jays from going to extra innings, the last thing they and their weary pitching staff needed at this point.

Given some rest over the past couple of days, the bullpen looked much stronger Saturday.

"I thought Jason had a much better life on his fastball, Ollie's had a couple of days down so they came fresh, they came rested and they put up quality work," said Farrell.

Cecil threw 87 pitches last Sunday in a 6-2 win over the Philadelphia Phillies, pulled after five frames when manager John Farrell began to see some elevation in his pitches, likely a result of fatigue and mechanical breakdowns.

"At times they're one and the same, or they're inter-related for sure," explained Farrell. "I felt like when he was getting to 90 pitches, didn't see quite the same power or lateness to the secondary stuff."

This time Cecil held things together for a bit longer and used his pitches more efficiently, holding the Marlins to five hits and three walks over his six frames.

"Brett did an outstanding job," said Farrell. "Offensively against Johnson we weren't getting much going, he pitched an outstanding ballgame for them, and Brett did a very solid job for us."

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THE BIG PICTURE: The Blue Jays (37-34) won for the sixth time in eight games, and are now 9-8 against the National League this season. For the first time since going 10-8 in 2007, they are guaranteed to finish at least .500 in interleague play, but will have a winning record by completing a sweep Sunday. The Marlins (33-38) lost their sixth in a row before a crowd of 24,448 and have dropped 15 of their past 17 outings.

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THE ARMS: The Blue Jays are looking to find five starters to give them five innings on a consistent basis and Cecil is looking like he could be part of that mix. The Colorado Rockies have caught people's attention with their plan to use four starters, but Farrell feels his team isn't able to do that right now.

"We've got a little bit more unknown in our rotation than maybe one that would be able to say OK, let's go with these four guys that we know what we're going to get from," he said.

Cecil has handled the challenges before him well so far, but a stiffer test will come in his next outing, when he faces the Los Angeles Angels. The Marlins came into the game hitting .226/.299/.393 versus left-handed pitching and did little to frighten any southpaws out there.

Still, he showed an ability to make an adjustments on the mound, something he couldn't do last year. Struggling to locate his fastball Saturday, he started cutting the ball a bit to help get it down in the zone on advice from pitching coach Bruce Walton, and was able to escape jams.

"Last year I was trying to make adjustments to combat the velocity, now I'm making adjustments about the location, I'm not trying to throw harder, it makes things worse," said Cecil. "Now if I'm trying to adjust something, I just try to stay smooth in my delivery and not give it too much effort, just get the ball down and once I had that good feeling of where the arm slot's going to be, that's when I can start quickening things up."

Darren Oliver (2-2) pitched a scoreless eighth for the win, Casey Janssen mopped up in the ninth, while Steve Cishek (4-1) was burned for most of the damage in the ninth.

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THE BATS: The Blue Jays have now scored 53 runs in their past eight games and one reason for that is the production they've been getting from the bottom of the order, led by Rajai Davis.

In the 21 games since Eric Thames was optioned to triple-A Las Vegas, Davis is batting .324 with an on-base percentage of .387, two homers, 10 RBIs, seven walks and nine stolen bases in 11 attempts. He brought home the game's first run in the second with a sacrifice bunt that plated Encarnacion, and was walked intentionally to help set up Mathis' bunt in the ninth.

The big difference in him at the plate this year is that he's hitting right-handed pitching. Last year he was .221/.239/.313 against them, while he entered Saturday's action at .300/.355/.457.

"He's done a really good job of getting a fastball early in the count and not missing it," said Farrell. "And I think that's the result of a much more consistent swing, we'll still see him fall over occasionally at the plate, but his swing path has been more consistent so when he gets a pitch on the plate, he's been able to handle that fastball early in the count."

With him, Jose Bautista, Rasmus, Brett Lawrie and Encarnacion all doing damage, the Blue Jays lineup is as dangerous as it's been all season.

"Jose's been dropping bombs and I think everybody can feed off of that because he's our big man," said Rasmus. "When he's right and having a good time out there I think everybody feeds off of that and that shows in our offence."

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LEAVING LAS VEGAS?: With the Blue Jays due to get the DH back now that the end of interleague play is approaching, might Adam Lind factor back into their plans?

The first baseman is hitting .439/.477/.878 with four homers, six doubles and 12 RBIs over his past 10 games before Saturday and could potentially be the impact left-handed bat Farrell is seeking.

Travis Snider, who's three-game home run streak ended Friday, is slowly returning to form but with Davis playing well in left field right now, his path back to the majors may once again be blocked for now.

Lind could slide back into first base, with Encarnacion primarily serving as DH.

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GREAT GLOVEWORK: Marlins centre-fielder Justin Ruggiano robbed Brett Lawrie of extra bases and two RBIs in the fifth by chasing down a liner over his head and leaping with his back to home to snare the ball and keep the Blue Jays lead at 1-0. Base-runners Yunel Ecobar and Rajai Davis would have scored easily had the ball dropped, and Lawrie was likely looking at triple, possibly more.

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SANTOS TOSSING: Blue Jays closer Sergio Santos (shoulder) has resumed throwing on flat ground but there is no timeline for him to begin throwing off a mound again.

"The last two times he's felt very good," said Farrell. "There's no timeframe at all."