Bisons' Jansen homers twice on four-hit night

In the seventh inning Monday night, Danny Jansen got his marching orders.
"After the third at-bat, I was standing on first and [Red Sox first baseman Blake Swihart] said, 'You've gotta get a double now,'" Toronto's No. 18 prospect said. "Obviously, [hitting for the cycle] is in your head. You're thinking about it. But whatever makes a better situation for the team, that's what I'm going to do. If I hit a ball into the gap, I was going to be busting for three."
Instead, Jansen cracked his second long ball of the game -- one that started a four-run rally in the ninth inning -- to lift Triple-A Buffalo to a 6-3 win over Pawtucket at McCoy Stadium. The 2013 16th-round pick is hitting .500 (18-for-36) in his first 12 International League games.

In his first healthy full season, the 22-year-old has shot through the Blue Jays system. Coming off an Arizona Fall League in which he stood out behind the plate and batted .282, he bopped his way out of Class A Advanced Dunedin with a .369/.422/.541 slash line through 31 games. After getting on base at a .378 clip over 52 games with Double-A New Hampshire, he's logged multiple hits in half of his Triple-A games since debuting on Aug. 4.
"It's been exciting. It's been a ride," Jansen said. "I've had a crazy year, but I try to stay level-headed and ride the wave. I always try to come to the field confident and that's easy when the teammates all welcome you with open arms. This team, everybody's got great energy, so it's easy to feed off of it."
Gameday box score
The Elmhurst, Illinois native collected his ninth homer of the season with a solo shot to left field on a 1-1 pitch off No. 15 Red Sox prospectBrian Johnson in the second. Two frames later, he tripled to center on Johnson's first offering, but was picked off third by catcher Dan Butler with Shane Opitz at the plate.
"It's definitely a little bit of a confidence boost, getting the two [extra-base hits in my first two at-bats], even though I got picked off at third base," Jansen said. "I just wanted to stay level-headed and use that confidence in the next at-bats, and stay clear-minded. That's really all I'm trying to do in every at-bat."

A ground-ball single up the middle off Edgar Olmos in the seventh put the 6-foot-2, 225-pound backstop a two-bagger away from the cycle. Instead, he drove Olmos' first pitch over the wall in left to snap a 3-3 deadlock.
"It's weird -- I don't like swinging at first pitches," Jansen admitted. "I get more comfortable as the at-bat goes on. I don't really ever swing at the first one and sometimes it's a fastball right down the middle. So in those situations, I want to jump on it and put the barrel on the ball and see what happens. That's what I did. When I hit it, it felt good, but I saw [left fielder Ryan Court] busting back for it and going over the wall, and it looked like he robbed it. I'm running around the bases, and I didn't see him for, like, four seconds, and I'm wondering what's happening. Then the ump told me it was a home run.
"It's the greatest feeling. I kind of blacked out there for a minute. It's just awesome, especially with the great team win, the big home run by [Christian Lopes in the ninth] puts us up by three and then for [Carlos Ramirez] to shut the door."
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Lopes, Gregorio Petit and Dwight Smith Jr. had two hits apiece, while Ramirez (1-0) threw 2 1/3 perfect innings of relief for Buffalo.