Manoah, Bichette get the job done

Three things you need to know about the Blue Jays’ 3-1 win over the Cincinnati Reds at the Rogers Centre on Saturday:

Manoah masterful

In what’s been a career of tremendous performances, Saturday’s ranks right up there for Blue Jay Alek Manoah as he comes up on the one-year anniversary of his majorleague debut, which is less than a week away.

The big righty was every bit the ace, delivering eight innings and allowing just one Cincinnati run on seven hits without issuing a walk.

He came up especially huge with the game tied in the seventh inning after allowing a leadoff double to Tyler Stephenson.

A ground ball got the runner to third with only one out, but then Manoah struck out Colin Moran and coaxed a grounder to second from Alejo López, stranding the runner.

Manoah needed just eight pitches to get through the top of the eighth and, with an extremely efficient 83 pitches thrown, his day was done.

The last nine-inning complete game thrown by a Blue Jay was by Marcus Stroman in Anaheim on April 23, 2017.

Bo bombs

All three Jays runs were driven in by Bo Bichette with two swings of the bat: a first-pitch solo homer off a hanging slider by Hunter Greene led off the fourth, and a first-pitch, two-run shot off a Luis Cessa slider in the seventh — right after George Springer had been thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double.

The first home run was the 50th of Bichette’s career. He’s hitting .296 in May.

GTA East vs. West

In the top of the ninth inning, Reds first baseman Joey Votto, an Etobicoke native, stood in against Markham’s Jordan Romano, the Jays’ closer, for the first time.

It was a good battle, with Votto fouling off two-strike fastballs at 98 and 97 miles per hour before swinging through 96-m.p.h. heat for the second of Romano’s three straight strikeouts to finish the game.