POWER SURGE

Bichette’s blasts against Reds were just what the Blue Jays needed

Around the batting cage, before the game, George Springer announced he was going to hang out a bit longer after he got his cuts in.

“I’m gonna watch my boy Bo lace a few.”

Maybe he’d like to rub Bo Bichette’s head for swatting luck, too, run his fingers through that glorious hair. Maybe they all should.

Bichette teed off on a couple of pitches — a slider from Cincinnati starter and rather freakish righthander Hunter Greene, he of the 100-m.p.h.-plus stuff, youngest moundsman in the majors and cochoreographer of a no-hit loss a week earlier; and a slider from Greene’s seventh-inning reliever, Luis Cessa — to pretty much provide all the offence Toronto required in dusting off the Reds 3-1 Saturday afternoon.

A brace of jacks plus five scattered hits felt like a deluge ’round the hitting-mystifying Blue Jays, as much of a torrent as was apparently monsooning outside the zippered carapace of the Rogers Centre. (Storm? What storm?)

It wasn’t so long ago that Bichette was likewise bedevilled by hitting dearth. Then he received some remedial tutoring from dad Dante — formerly a hitting consultant for the team — and rediscovered his stroke. Can someone please get Dante on the phone for a conference call?

Aggressive as all get out was Bichette, which is his M.O., as manager Charlie Montoyo pointed out: “The funny thing about Bo, that guys get on him for, is he swings a lot. But his two home runs today were on the first pitch.”

The dapper young dude just loves swinging from the heels at the first pitch he sees: offers at 50.6 per cent of the first pitches he’s dealt (according to the most helpful Blue Jays statistician sitting right next to me), which is fifth highest in the majors.

Aggressive, maintained Bichette, “is everything.”

“Aggressiveness with a plan, for sure,” he said later — much, much later, because seems it takes upwards of an hour to shower after getting a mega-jug of water dumped all over oneself in the postgame folderol. (Although we can’t say much for his musical taste, as allegedly the clubhouse playlist — Lionel Richie? — was down to Bo.)

“But I’ll tell you what. No one wins anything or accomplishes anything being passive. You have to go out there and give it everything you’ve got and trust in your ability and your work, and I did that today.”

Hallelujah somebody’s ripping the skin off the ball on this hit-lite — who would have imagined it? — club. (Props here to Santiago Espinal, who extended his career-best

hitting streak to 14 games with a single.)

Those round-trippers, leading off the fourth and with two-out in the seventh — the latter a two-run belt that also scored Raimel Tapia, after Springer was thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double — were Nos. 50 and 51 in the annals for Bichette, fifth and sixth this season, for his sixth career multi-homer game. Timely too, those bombs, all of them either tying the game or giving Toronto the lead.

Not that Bichette had even been aware of arriving at the mid-century mark, tattoo-wise.

“Umm, I never knew that was a milestone. I’m grateful to be able to … have an opportunity to hit home runs in the major leagues. Yeah, just excited about the game.”

Kind of meh, though, about the strapping six-foot-five rookie on the bump, who’s making all kinds of noise with a fastball that’s touched 104 m.p.h. — although, however stupendous his velocity, the 22-yearold dragged a 6.21 ERA and 1-6 record to the hill with him on this afternoon, 1-7 when it was over.

“I didn’t know what he did last week,” Bichette admitted of the quasi-no-no in Pittsburgh. “I still don’t know.”

The fastball isn’t what Bichette crushed, of course. Saw the slider and licked his chops.

“Well, yeah, 101 is fast.” Greene hit 101.4 on a 3-and-2 heater fouled off by Matt Chapman. “So I think that the slider just plays up when you are trying to hit 101. So just try not to rush yourself and stay calm.”

In fact, for all his fireballing, Greene — did we mention he also plays the violin and likes to paint? — was outpitched by Alek Manoah, who went eight innings for his fifth W of the season, allowing just one run on seven hits with no walks and four strikeouts.

Manoah, who’s even huger than Greene and has got a year of bigleague ball on him, was slick and dominating as he matched his career high with those eight innings, with Kevin Gausman the only other in Toronto’s starter cadre to last that long so far.

“Just being able to throw in the zone was the biggest thing,” the 24year-old righty claimed afterwards. “Being able to attack with the heater, being able to mix in some offspeeds there, get some weak contact. Just being able to get that offence out there and let them get in the groove.”

Not that offence — let’s be honest here, Alek — but it was enough with the way he was dealing, only once really getting in a dicey situation: a runner at third and less than two out in the seventh, handled coolly with a strikeout and easy-peasy ground-ball out. “Didn’t really strike that many out today, but I know I need one right there, so I kind of geared back for some good velo.”

His velo actually increased as the game progressed, edging up to 97m.p.h. territory, as if that right arm wasn’t feeling any strain: “I don’t really throw based on a pitch count.”

Yet, reflecting how efficient and thrifty he’d been on the afternoon, Manoah threw only 83 pitches, which surely stood him in good stead for that thing which has become such a rarity in baseball: the complete game.

Montoyo, alas, wasn’t have any of it, as he summoned Jordan Romano to close it out for his American League-leading 14th save, striking out all three batters he faced.

“Because I’ve got the best closer in baseball,” Montoyo said, and then repeated it.

Manoah deeply wanted that complete game and tried to mount an argument: “I did, but I’m not the manager.”

The guy who is the manager treated Manoah like a big baby.

And hey, is there an echo in here? “Obviously we’ve got the best closer in baseball,” said Manoah, obligingly delivering his line. “So it doesn’t matter what my pitch count is, he’s coming in.”