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Bautista, who has missed the last six games with a stiff neck, took hitting practice in the hitting cages and ran on the field Saturday to test himself against his injury.

Manager John Farrell said the activity did not reproduce any of the pain Bautista experienced when he suffered the injury a week ago in New York.

Farrell said barring any setbacks, Bautista could be back in the lineup as soon as Sunday against Detroit (possibly in a DH role).

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The Jays on Saturday optioned IF Mike McCoy to class-AAA Las Vegas and activated 2B Aaron Hill off the 15-day disabled list (hamstring injury).

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Jays 1B Adam Lind was pulled from Saturday’s game in the seventh inning after experiencing stiffness in his lower back.

Manager John Farrell said Lind “felt like it wasn’t loosening up anymore,” so the team decided to take him out of the game for precautionary reasons.

Farrell said Lind is day-to-day but hopes the layoff “is not too long and too severe.”

A career first no-hitter back in 2007 helped Verlander handle nerves and adrenalin spikes Saturday. The rest was pure nasty — he touched 100 miles per hour on the speed gun in each of the final three innings as he mowed the Jays down 9-0 before 23,453 appreciative onlookers at the Rogers Centre.

“I felt fantastic obviously I was extremely excited, but being able to recall the last one and go through it, it was really able to calm me down. I was able to calm myself down a lot more because having thrown another one,” said Verlander, 28, who tossed his first no-no against Milwaukee back in ‘07.

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The nuts and bolts of it were numbing to the Jays for sure. The first 22 Toronto batters went down in order. With one out in the eighth, Verlander walked JP Arencibia in a tremendous 12 pitch at bat to lose his bid for a perfect game.

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“It was a hell of an at-bat … amazing at-bat especially for a young guy like himself,” said Verlander. “He laid off some good pitches, he fouled off some good pitches. I can’t say enough about the way he battled that at-bat.”

The Las Vegas 51s, Triple-A franchise of the Toronto Blue Jays in the Pacific Coast League, have been sold to a Vegas sports group with designs on bringing pro franchises to the gambling capital of North America.

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The Las Vegas National Sports Center is near completion and, at just under $2 billion U.S., will include a new ballpark, 17,500-seat arena suitable for the NBA and 36,000-seat outdoor stadium for soccer. Ultimately, the soccer stadium could be expanded to 72,000 for an NFL team, while the baseball field could handle 36,000 for major league baseball.

Ask Las Vegas 51s manager Marty Brown who hotshot Blue Jays prospect Brett Lawrie reminds him of and he’s quick off the mark: Chris Sabo.

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Few gave Sabo a chance to make the Reds in 1988 but his all-out hustle, desire and hitting ability immediately impressed his manager, who just happened to have fashioned a hall-of-fame worthy career with those talents, Pete Rose.

Baseball’s all-time hits leader said Sabo reminded him of himself. A knee injury to incumbent third baseman Buddy Bell further opened the door that Sabo burst through.

“Sabo was smoother but like Lawrie, he was hard-nosed, could steal some bases and had some power,” says Brown.

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Lawrie still has a few holes in his swing but can adjust to a pitcher’s offerings not just from at-bat to at-bat but also from pitch to pitch, says Brown.

“Sometimes he can be overly aggressive. He’s learning.”

Defensively, the one-time catcher and second baseman has some edges to smooth out. Thus far, he’s made six errors playing home games on what Brown calls a “fielder unfriendly” infield.

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At 21, Lawrie still has plenty of time to get to the big leagues and he knows it.

“He comes to play every day. He takes his career very seriously. He trusts that the Blue Jays and our staff will tell him when he’s ready,” said Brown.

“He does a lot of things that are major-league ready.”

On the mound, the next Jays starter ready for a promotion is crafty lefty Brad Mills, whose 2-2 mark belies his 2.03 ERA.

Brown said that although Mills “doesn’t have the best overall stuff — outside of a really good changeup,” he continues to pitch inside as well as anyone.

“He’s already proven that he can pitch in the major leagues,” said Brown adding that with another year of experience under his belt, Mills has blossomed in a hitters’ park and hitters’league.

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Brett Cecil (1-1, 10.64 ERA) has had one horrific outing and one good outing. After getting lit up in a cold and blustery night in Colorado Springs, the Jays’ winningest pitcher in 2010 continues to work on increasing his velocity and improving the command of his pitches.

“He’s come down here with a real good attitude. One that some would think would not be there after winning 15 games in the majors last season,” said Brown.

Travis Snider (.524, 0 HRs, 3 RBIs in 5 games) has gotten off to a nice start since his demotion last week with nine singles and two doubles in 21 at-bats. The 23-year-old continues to work on his swing through instruction and video work.


“He’s making adjustments, trying to get the bat more out in front. He got into some bad habits. Now he just has to break these habits,” said Brown.

In Justin Verlander’s case, it was a tiny mechanical tweak to his arm angle that nevertheless took a whole 12 months to find. “A simple fix, really,” according to the Detroit Tigers ace. So keep that in mind if you are worrying about whether Brett Cecil will be back in the majors.

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Like Cecil, Verlander suffered a startling loss in velocity in 2008, when after tossing 387 2/3 innings over his previous two seasons – 186 of which came in his 2006 rookie-of-the-year campaign – his fastball fell to 91 miles an hour from 95-96.

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“The first thing you want to do is get your velocity back, which is the wrong way to go about it,” Verlander said on Friday. “All the issues you are having compound. If I could go back and do it all over again, I’d just pitch with what I had – and not try to do too much.

“There was nothing wrong physically. I felt better than I ever had in the big leagues up to that point – and I think that was probably just because my arm wasn’t working as hard,” Verlander added with a chuckle.

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Cecil’s loss of velocity was pinpointed by the pitcher himself after what was in fact a pretty decent spring start. Friday night’s outing, against Tacoma, was his third since being sent down. Cecil was rocked in a 4 1/3-inning start in messy weather at Colorado Springs in his first start, and struck out five and issued two walks while giving up six hits over 6 2/3 innings in his next outing, in which the Blue Jays were pleased to see a two-inning segment in which he was consistently 90-92 mph.

“The approach we are going to take is to ask him to use his fastball more, with the idea it will increase the overall arm strength,” said Blue Jays manager John Farrell. “There is no magic number as far as velocity, but I think any time you can pitch at the high end of your range more consistently than it makes the secondary stuff that much better.”

The most impressive thing to date about the Blue Jays under new manager John Farrell?

“The way they run, the way they steal runs,” said an American League scout.

Stealing runs?

“Last weekend in New York, they stole an important run against the Yankees and they did it earlier this season, too,” said the scout, who compared it to watching an Oklahoma-Oklahoma State game some nights.

“They’re pulling college base-running tricks on major-leaguers ... and it’s working.”

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“It’s all about creating more opportunities,” Bautista said. “It all starts with Davis and Patterson. We talked about doing things differently on the bases this spring. I mean we talked a lot.

“We don’t have the same lineup as a year ago when it comes to power.”