Photos by Tommy Gilligan and Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports
The Blue Jays and Orioles both won their regular-season finales to secure the American League wild-cards spots on the final day of the season.Baltimore downed New York with a 5-2 win at Yankee Stadium, while Toronto won in Boston, inching past the Red Sox with a 2-1 victory. The Tigers had a chance to force a tiebreaker game and play for a potential wild-card spot, but were eliminated from postseason contention with a 1-0 loss to the Braves.Blue Jays starter Aaron Sanchez took a no-hitter into the seventh inning before Hanley Ramirez busted it up with a towering home run to left field over the Green Monster to even the score at 1-1. But Toronto responded an inning later on a Troy Tulowitzki RBI single to take a 2-1 lead, which held up as the final. The win ensured the Blue Jays home field for Tuesday's wild-card game against Baltimore.The two division rivals finished with identical 89-73 records, but the Blue Jays held the head-to-head tiebreaker, beating Baltimore 10 times in 19 games this season, to set up the win-or-go-home game at Rogers Centre. It's the second consecutive season the 2015 AL-champion Blue Jays have qualified for the playoffs. They snapped the longest postseason drought in baseball last year by earning their first playoff spot since 1993.For the Orioles, it's the third they've made the playoffs in the last five seasons and first since going to the ALCS in 2014. They recently took two of three games from the Blue Jays in Toronto earlier this week.The winner of Tuesday's wild-card game will play the Rangers in the LDS. Cleveland will host the Red Sox in the other ALDS matchup.