"All night — actually for the second night in a row — the Indians littered the bases with runners, then watched them wither and die.

Granted, they beat the New York Yankee 5-3 Wednesday, stranding 13, but could they win two in a row with such inefficiency? The answer was yes.

Travis Hafner stepped to the plate with one out, one run home and the bases loaded in the ninth and drove Luis Perez's first pitch into the right-field seats for a grand slam that gave the Tribe a 5-4 win over the Toronto Blue Jays at Progressive Field.

"I got kind of a scouting report from [Michael] Brantley on Perez," said Hafner, talking about why he swung at the first pitch. "He said the guy had a good sinker, so I was looking for something up in the zone."

In other words, as a left-handed batter, Hafner had no desire to try to hit a left-hander's sinker.

"I tried to do it early," Hafner said, laughing.

It was no joke to the Blue Jays, who held a 4-0 lead going into the ninth.

So Hafner's 12th career slam wasn't the only problem for the visitors, and especially Perez, who had help in making Hafner's day.

"It's awesome," Hafner said. "There's nothing like it. It's the most fun you can have in baseball."

Frank Francisco started the inning for the Jays and gave up a single to Travis Buck, a double to Matt LaPorta and a walk to Jack Hannahan to load the bases.

Enter Perez, who struck out Brantley but gave up a single to Asdrubal Cabrera to drive in the first run and bring up Hafner.

"We had the right guy up there, but it started with the guys at the bottom of our lineup," Indians manager Manny Acta said. "After the first two guys got on — I didn't think about a walk-off — but I thought we had a pretty good chance with our lineup rolling over."