Jordan Romano knows that baseball is a game of inches. Over the weekend, he was reminded that it’s a numbers game too. A slight adjustment to his mechanics helped the relief pitcher from Markham, Ont. add several miles per hour to his fastball, ushering in a dominant stretch at triple-A Buffalo that led to his promotion to the major leagues on June 12. And it was a roster crunch that resulted in Romano’s demotion 11 days later, despite impressing his manager and the Blue Jays front office during his brief but memorable stint with Toronto.

Jordan Romano’s grandmother had only seen him pitch once, and never professionally. On Wednesday night in Toronto, she saw him strike out the best hitter in the game. Pitching on home soil for the first time, the big righthander from Markham, Ont. got Mike Trout looking on a night that the Angels star otherwise had his way with Blue Jays pitching.

A pair of gopher balls served up by Blue Jays starter Marcus Stroman proved to be the difference as Toronto’s anemic offence mounted little challenge against the Los Angeles Angels Tuesday night. The punchless Jays mustered just three hits, falling to the Halos 3-1 at Rogers Centre.

When he was eight years old, Canadian Baseball Network writer J.P. Antonacci tried to stump Toronto Blue Jays legendary broadcaster Jerry Howarth with some baseball trivia questions. He couldn’t do it. But that first interaction has led to long bond between the two that Antonacci is very grateful for.

Canadian Baseball Network writer J.P. Antonacci reviews longtime Toronto Blue Jays’ play-by-play man Jerry Howarth’s new book which is appropriately called “Hello Friends!”