{"id":490921,"date":"2026-02-21T23:48:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T23:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/490921\/"},"modified":"2026-02-21T23:48:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T23:48:08","slug":"toronto-blue-jays-blank-philadelphia-phillies-as-daulton-varsho-sean-keys-homer-in-grapefruit-league-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/490921\/","title":{"rendered":"Toronto Blue Jays blank Philadelphia Phillies as Daulton Varsho, Sean Keys homer in Grapefruit League opener"},"content":{"rendered":"

DUNEDIN \u2014 The Toronto Blue Jays<\/a> defeated the Philadelphia Phillies<\/a> 3-0 on Saturday in their Grapefruit League opener at TD Ballpark.<\/p>\n

Daulton Varsho<\/a>, who started at designated hitter, opened the scoring with a solo home run in the fifth inning, and first baseman Sean Keys added a two-run shot in the sixth.<\/p>\n

Eric Lauer<\/a> started on the mound and Toronto\u2019s pitching staff held Philadelphia to four hits over nine shutout innings, while the Blue Jays recorded nine hits off Phillies pitching.<\/p>\n

It was Toronto\u2019s first game since a 5-4 extra innings loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers<\/a> in Game 7 of the World Series.<\/p>\n

The off-season brought significant change in Toronto, with all-star shortstop Bo Bichette<\/a> leaving for the New York Mets<\/a> in free agency and the Blue Jays signing infielder Kazuma Okamoto and right handers Dylan Cease<\/a> and Cody Ponce to reshape the roster.<\/p>\n

Okamoto arrived after an 11-year career with the Yomiuri Giants of Nippon Professional Baseball. Cease joined following seven major league seasons with the Chicago White Sox<\/a> and San Diego Padres<\/a>, and Ponce came off a 17-1 campaign with the Hanwha Eagles that earned him MVP honours in South Korea\u2019s KBO League.<\/p>\n

Toronto continues its spring schedule Sunday against the Boston Red Sox<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DUNEDIN \u2014 The Toronto Blue Jays defeated the Philadelphia Phillies 3-0 on Saturday in their Grapefruit League opener…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":490922,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194291],"tags":[49,48,82,3302],"class_list":["post-490921","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-toronto","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-toronto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=490921"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490921\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/490922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=490921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=490921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=490921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}