Die Allianz T-D-P » who has built a long and successful ca

TORONTO -- A rare chance to pitch with a lead gave R.A. Dickey the opportunity to be more than just a knuckleballer.Russell Martin had three hits and two RBI, Dickey pitched 6 2/3 innings for his first home win since July 10 and the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Los Angeles Angels 7-2 on Tuesday night.Toronto remained tied with Boston for first place in the AL East. The Red Sox beat Tampa Bay 2-1.Dickey had received eight total runs of support in his previous five starts, losing three. His teammates gave him six runs to work with Tuesday, which he appreciated.Always great pitching with the lead, Dickey said. You can take some little risks that you might not normally take. Threw a lot of good changeups tonight, good sinkers down in the zone. I actually had good conventional stuff tonight and that helped me through some innings when I didnt have a great knuckleball.Dickey (9-13) came in 2-8 with a 5.57 ERA in 13 home starts but held the last-place Angels in check, allowing two runs and six hits.Manager John Gibbons said Dickey was fantastic after giving up a two-run homer to Angels rookie Nick Buss in the second.Then he kind of put it in cruise control, Gibbons said.Martin had an RBI single in the first, drove in a run with a bases-loaded walk in the third, singled and scored in the fifth, and doubled over the head of center fielder Mike Trout in the seventh. Martin is 12 for 27 with nine RBI in his past five games.Hes smoking hot right now, Gibbons said.Michael Saunders hit his 21st home run, a solo shot off A.J. Achter in the eighth, and Edwin Encarnacion and Darwin Barney each reached base three times as the Blue Jays won their fifth straight over the Angels. Toronto has outscored Los Angeles 51-16 in that span.Down the stretch every game is important, Barney said. I dont think were taking anyone lightly.Buss hit his first major league home run, but Los Angeles lost for the fourth time in six games. The Angels have lost 15 of 18 overall.He looks very comfortable at the plate, Angels manager Mike Scioscia said of Buss. Hes certainly not overmatched. Hes hitting the ball hard. He looks like he belongs here.The Angels lost their 11th straight road game, their longest such skid since a 14-game streak in 1969.Trailing 2-1, Toronto loaded the bases with no outs against left-hander Tyler Skaggs in the third. Barney scored the tying run when Martin walked and Encarnacion put the Blue Jays in front by scoring on Troy Tulowitzkis double play groundout.Skaggs (1-3) allowed four runs and four hits in four-plus innings and is winless in five starts. His five walks were a season-worst.Unfortunately, kind of the same stuff weve seen the last couple of starts, Scioscia said. Whether its a release point issue, whether its a mechanical adjustment or whatever it is, hes a hair off right now and hes not able to make the pitches he needs to.JOEY BATS ALMOST BACKBlue Jays OF Jose Bautista (left knee) is expected be activated off the 15-day DL as soon as he is eligible on Thursday. Gibbons said Bautista will be used at DH often to protect his knee.CRIME DOESNT PAYJosh Donaldson was caught stealing in the fifth, snapping a streak of 23 consecutive successful attempts. He hadnt been caught stealing since June 3, 2013, with Oakland.TRAINERS ROOMBlue Jays: 2B Devon Travis was not available after getting a cortisone injection in his sore right ring finger. Barney started in his place. ... OF Kevin Pillar (sprained left thumb) was activated off the 15-day DL and started in center field. RHP Ryan Tepera was optioned to Triple-A Buffalo to clear a spot for Pillar.UP NEXTAngels: RHP Matt Shoemaker (7-13, 4.14) is 1-1 with an 8.38 ERA in two career games against Toronto.Blue Jays: RHP Marco Estrada (7-5, 3.20) allowed a season-high five earned runs against the Yankees on Aug. 16. It was the third time in 21 starts this season Estrada has allowed more than three earned runs. Fake Jerseys From China .S. hockey team after paying his dues as an NHL general manager for more than three decades and giving up a lot of his free time to help USA Hockey. Wholesale Fake Jerseys . Cote was eligible to become a free agent Feb. 15. Cote helped running back Jon Cornish run for a league-high 1,813 rushing yards en route to being named the leagues most outstanding player. https://www.fakejersey.com/ . William Carrier opened the scoring for Cape Breton (6-4-2), but Andrew Ryan tied the game and Brent Andrews put the Mooseheads (8-6-0) in front for good with a short-handed goal at 13:49 of the second period. Fake Jerseys Outlet . 10 Texas A&Ms offence dominated as usual against SMU. Fake Jerseys Free Shipping . PETERSBURG, Fla. As President Obama might say, my daughter is a badass. I dont say that just because shes my daughter. As the president did when he met the members of the U.S. womens national soccer team after they won the World Cup last year, I offer that description up in the broadest of terms.That same term applies to many of my daughters teammates through years of club soccer that have seen us travel around the South and across the country. Ive seen them get knocked down and bounce right back up. Ive seen them limp around the field, trying to shake off a twisted ankle to stay in the game. Ive seen them suffer difficult losses and play in pouring rain and frigid cold.Im glad my daughter, Lucy, is part of it. And Im glad I have been there to see it.I am a soccer dad, twice over. My son is in college now, but he also played travel soccer for years. I loved watching him play and seeing his confidence grow as he kept moving up to better teams through the years. But soccer wasnt as critical to my relationship with my son as it has been with my daughter.We have some differences, she and I. My daughter has a clear sense of fashion, while I shop the clearance rack at Kohls. She uses her phone for endless snaps and selfies, while I use mine to check sports scores and play Words with Friends. And there are certain areas where conversations between fathers and daughters are tricky at best. Soccer, though, has provided us with a shared experience since she first enjoyed orange slices and juice boxes at halftime and ran through tunnels created by the parents outstretched arms after games.I didnt play the game growing up, but Ive come to appreciate it and all that its meant to my kids. Unlike the sports I grew up with, there are no timeouts in soccer. Players have to make hundreds of decisions during a game -- without a coach telling them what to do -- about when and where to pass, when to attack and when to pull back and defend. To have any chance at success, they have to work with and rely on their teammates. Its a game that values speed, technical ability, teamwork, intelligence, stamina, athleticism and the willingness to be physical. (Lucy points with pride to the various bruises and scrapes on her legs, treasuring each one as a memento from various high school and club games.)But where the game has helped me connect with my daughter is off the field, on the drives to and from practice or the road trips to games and tournaments. Weve driven through a West Virginia snowstorm to get to an indoor soccer tournament in Detroit in February, flown to Seattle to play against some of the best teams in the country and spent the holidays in Orlando more times than I care to count. Ive rinsed out stinky jerseys and soccer socks in hotel sinks and made late-night runs to get Gatorade. Im always up for arranging some sort of side trip, having nothing to do with soccer, to check out something interesting in the area.All that travel translates into great family time -- time to play card games, talk about how schools going or watch HGTV together in the hotel room. Occasionally the talk is about soccer.One topic of frequent discussion is the U.S. womens national team. We rarely miss a chance to watch them play, even if its just a friendly on TV.dddddddddddd The women on that team are rock stars to my daughter and her teammates, and I will never forget the thrill it was for Lucy when she got a photo with Megan Rapinoe, her favorite player, when the team played in North Carolina a couple of years ago. So while Im curious to see how Michael Phelps will do in the pool and whether anyone can beat Usain Bolt in the 100 meters, my daughter and I will be most interested in the U.S. womens soccer team as they go after their fourth consecutive Olympic gold medal in Rio later this summer.I wondered whether the dads of the women on the U.S. national team felt the same as I did about soccer helping their relationship with their daughters. I managed to touch base with Ken Krieger, father of defender Ali Krieger, and Vincent Dunn, father of midfielder and forward Crystal Dunn. Not surprisingly, they also had tales of weekends spent traveling to tournaments and car rides home after games or practices spent listening as their daughters recounted their experience.Both fathers were most interested in talking about who their daughters have become off the field. The thing Im most proud of has absolutely nothing to do with soccer, said Vincent Dunn, a finance attorney in New York. Crystal is just a genuinely good person. She cares about other people and is a fun person.Krieger, a former player who has built a long and successful career as a youth soccer and basketball coach in and around Washington, D.C., recounted an experience years ago when his daughter got a chance to see Mia Hamm play. What she remembered from that day was watching Hamm sign autographs for what seemed like hours afterward. She told her father that she would do the same thing one day if she ever got the chance. Im usually in the bleachers for an hour after her games, Ken Krieger told me, waiting for her to finish signing autographs.My wife and I often talked as our kids moved up (and occasionally down) the ranks of club soccer about how we werent interested in raising soccer players. We wanted to raise kids who would go on to become good adults. Soccer has been one way to do that, imparting lessons in the value of determination, hard work and sportsmanship.Theyve learned how to handle defeat as well as victory. Theyve learned that the calls dont always go your way and that theres nothing to be gained by complaining about it. Theyve learned that while sometimes you have to figure things out for yourself, there are other times when you can rely on your teammates or, more importantly, be there for your teammates. Those are lessons that will serve them well long after their playing days are over.I will also treasure the bonds soccer has helped me build with Lucy. There are plenty of things she would rather talk with her mother about, and Im OK with that. But we have our own connection, and I will never complain about the money and time our family has spent on soccer.Bill Krueger is an editor at the alumni magazine at N.C. State University, where U.S. head coach Jill Ellis started her coaching career as a graduate assistant for the Wolfpack womens soccer team. ' ' '