KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- The Kansas City Royals' starting rotation looks to be getting hot at the right time.

Edinson Volquez pitched six shutout innings as the Royals defeated the Toronto Blue Jays 5-0 in Friday's opening game of the American League Championship Series.

Volquez's solid outing followed one from teammate Johnny Cueto in Wednesday's deciding Game 5 of the American League Division Series.

To get his six shutout innings, though, Volquez had to survive a 37-pitch sixth when he walked the first two batters. He struck out Edwin Encarnacion, got Chris Colabello on a line out to left and struck out Troy Tulowitzki to end the threat.

Alcides Escobar got things going early with a leadoff double on the first pitch of the game from Blue Jays starter Marco Estrada. And his first-pitch double in the third inning gave the Royals their first run. He scored on an RBI single from Lorenzo Cain.

Salvador Perez hit his third home run of the postseason in the fourth inning, a solo shot to left for a 3-0 lead.

Thumbs up: Volquez appeared to be on vapors during his final inning of work but made it through. He backed off the mound multiple times and was shaking out his right arm often but got the job done with most of the sellout crowd chanting, "Eddie, Eddie, Eddie." His six innings were a career high for a postseason start.

Thumbs down: The Royals are leading the ALCS 1-0 so they have nothing to complain about, but things would be much easier if Mike Moustakas were more involved in the offense. Moustakas went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts Friday after going 2-for-18 (.111) in the opening round. Eric Hosmer had been scuffling as well but delivered an insurance run in the eighth inning with an RBI double off the top of the wall.

Up next: The Royals will turn to Yordano Ventura in Saturday's Game 2. The right-hander was merely middle-of-the-road in the ALDS, giving up a combined six runs and eight hits over only seven innings in two starts. "[Toronto] is a very talented group, a lot of power, a lot of experience. But on the other end, I have got to do what I does best, and stay within my game and I'll be ready to go tomorrow," Ventura said through an interpreter.