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Alek Manoah arrived in the Motor City hoping to keep the good times rolling.

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He looked like the Alek Manoah of old in his previous two starts. Confident, intimidating, unrelenting and near unhittable.

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Manoah did not allow an earned run in that 14-inning stretch.

In addition, the Jays entered the second game of a four-game series in Detroit having finally discovered their groove at the plate.

No one, though, felt the Jays had turned the corner and nor was anyone suggesting Manoah had finally and fully recovered from the struggles that led him to the lower levels of the minors.

There were, however, signs of encouragement on both fronts.

Then Friday happened and the concerns resurfaced in Toronto’s 6-2 loss.

Manoah lacked control and lasted only 4.2 innings, a stint that featured two home runs being yielded and six runs surrendered, including four earned.

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A two-out walk set the table for a two-run bomb, effectively ending Manoah’s day.

Signs of distress were visible in the fourth inning when the host Tigers had Manoah and the Jays on the ropes.

Even had Manoah pitched the way he did in starts against Minnesota and Tampa, the Jays needed to summon their bats against a Detroit starter who had just been activated.

The Jays even had Daulton Varsho hit leadoff.

The game, believe it or not, began with the visitors recording two hits with two outs in the evening’s first at-bats.

When Justin Turner led off the seventh inning, it was Toronto’s fifth hit on the night.

Bad pitching, bad hitting, bad defence, it had the makings of a bad night and that’s exactly how it all played out.

The Jays avoided getting shut out for the second time in four games by finding holes in the ninth inning on soft contact with two outs, prompting the Tigers to go with their closer.

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FIELD OF SCREAMS

To borrow a line from the iconic and inimitable Ed Whalen: “There was a malfunction at the junction.’’

For the Jays, it arrived in the home half of the fourth.

It began on a shallow fly ball hit into left-centre, an area normally referred to as no-man’s land.

Both Varsho, who was in left, and Kevin Kiermaier, who was in centre, made a bee line to the ball.

Neither was able to come up with the catch because no one bothered to communicate.

It could have been worse had they completely collided into each other.

The official scorer charged Kiermaier with an error.

Had Kiermaier taken control of the situation the play would have been pretty routine.

Varsho made a very nice running catch to end the inning on a back-handed snare that saved two runs.

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Varsho and Kiermaier each ran off the field in unison, likely discussing the mental mistake that played out in the outfield.

For two players known for their defensive proficiency and high baseball IQ, it was inexcusable how the ball was allowed to hit the ground when it should have been caught.

COLT(ISH)

He first went deep off Manoah and then would get plunked by the Jays’ starter, a turn of events Colt Keith would gladly accept.

When he turned on a pitch and drilled it into right field for a no doubter in the second inning, it was Keith’s first-career home run.

When Colt was hit by a pitch in the fourth inning, it came during a three-run inning featuring all kinds of different plays and sequences.

Two runs were unearned.

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The Tigers were poised to push across even more runs in the inning, but Manoah reared back, dug deep and showed his resilient edge by keeping the damage somewhat contained.

Through four innings, Manoah’s pitch count reached 79, an indication of the harm that would soon be inflicted.

GOING OLD SCHOOL

For those who missed it, the power went out at Comerica Park in Thursday’s series opener, creating all sorts of havoc in an era where staying connected with the internet is akin to breathing.

To review: No relay review until the late innings, no readings when it applied to the radar gun, no access to iPads, while fans on both sides of the border had to deal with technical problems when watching from the comfort of home.

“Really weird,” Isiah Kiner-Falefa told reporters following Toronto’s win. “It was kind of refreshing. “When we found out what was going on, it was old-school baseball in a way. It’s your eyes. Your teammates have to talk and you have to rely on each other more, rather than just going out and looking at the screen and looking at the metrics.

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“It was a flash from the past and gave us all that feeling of being a kid.”

Imagine a pro athlete having to rely on basic instincts, imagine teammates forced to actually talk to each other as opposed to looking into a lap top.

For a few hours at least, it was old-school baseball at its best.

No such glitches surfaced Friday night when it was back to normal, back to resorting and relying on all the many numbers and readings that continue to drive the game.

Fans of a different vintage no doubt appreciate the simpler times when baseball was far less complicated.

Those days are long gone and never to return.

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THE OLD SWITCHEROO

The host Tigers altered their weekend pitching plans, which originally had right-hander Matt Manning scheduled to take the mound Friday.

Instead, Manning was optioned to triple-A Toledo in the hours leading up to the game’s first pitch.

The move paved the way for veteran righty Kenta Maeda being reinstated from the injured list.

Maeda started Friday and gave up back-to-back hits, a double by Vladimir Guerrero Jr. followed by a Bo Bichette single.

Vlad Jr. tried to score on the ball hit into short right field, but would get thrown out at the plate.

Vlad Jr. and Bichette did combine to record four hits.

As for the soft-tossing Maeda, he kept the Jays at bay in earning the win.

The Tigers will start Reese Olson on Saturday, Casey Mize in the series finale on Sunday when first pitch is scheduled at 11:35 a.m.

Jose Berrios and Yusei Kikuchi are Toronto’s scheduled starters this weekend.

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