Toronto's night in San Francisco started with a bang, and it wasn't the Cease kind. The Blue Jays jumped on the Giants immediately, plating a run in the first with the scoreboard flashing 5-0 before most fans had settled into their seats.
Toronto's offense wasted no time putting the Giants in an early hole.
While the bats were doing damage, Cease was quietly doing something even more impressive on the mound. Inning after inning, San Francisco couldn't buy a hit off him. By the 6th, a runner was getting thrown out at the plate trying to manufacture something, anything, off Toronto's starter, and the no-hit bid rolled on.
The 7th came and went the same way, with Toronto's infield cleaning up routine ground balls behind him while Cease sat at 91 mph late in his outing, still missing barrels.
Cease worked into the 7th still without allowing a hit, his defense backing him up.
Then came the play that had Blue Jays Twitter losing it. With Toronto now up 7-0 in the 8th, Daulton Varsho tracked one down at the wall and hauled it in, pumping his fist as he jogged back to the infield, no-hitter still intact.
Varsho's running catch at the wall kept the no-hitter alive in the 8th.
By the time Cease finished the 8th, he'd punched out 11 Giants and the building was buzzing for history. According to MLB.com, he'd been at 102 pitches after 7 but pushed to keep going, and after a quick, 9-pitch 8th, Toronto let him take the ball for the ninth. Toronto had also blown the game open by then, up 10-0 after a grand slam earlier in the game turned a laugher into a rout.
Cease worked out of the 8th with his strikeout total climbing and the no-no still in play.
It ended just 3 pitches into the ninth. Heliot Ramos lined a clean single to center, and that was that. Cease came out to a standing ovation, this time from the road crowd in San Francisco, as Toronto closed it out on the way to a 10-0 win. It's the second time in Cease's career he's lost a no-hit bid this late, having actually finished the job for the Padres back in 2024 — which only made watching this one slip away in the 9th sting a little more for Blue Jays fans.
The moment the no-hitter died, with Toronto up big and Cease exiting to applause.
No-hitter or not, this is exactly the kind of start Toronto traded for when they brought Cease over — swing-and-miss stuff, deep into games, with real strikeout totals. An 8 2/3-inning, 11-strikeout, 1-hit outing in a 10-0 win is the kind of line that gets circled all season, and it's a reminder the Blue Jays' rotation has another gear when Cease is dealing like this.