1. Edinson Volquez has his best October game ever: Getting six shutout innings from Kansas City Royals Game 1 starter Volquez against the Toronto Blue Jays was easily the key performance of the night. The man's 32 years old, he'd given up 12 runs in his previous 12 1/3 career postseason innings, including a loss to the Houston Astros in the ALDS. But Volquez came in firing fastballs clocked around 97 mph at the outset, a reminder that per PitchF/X data, he's throwing harder than at any point of his career, averaging just short of 95 mph. Add in a nifty knuckle-curve he sold early for strikes from plate umpire Tony Randazzo ...

Any time an ump will call a ball a strike you keep throwing it. Outer edge is wide, use it

— Curt Schilling (@gehrig38) October 17, 2015

Point taken, but Volquez's stuff was just nasty Friday, and he could afford to be pitch-inefficient as long as it kept people confused. He ended up throwing 111 pitches, leaning more and more heavily on his fastball as the night went on, but mixing that change and knuckle-curve that have combined to make him so much more of a craftsman than the pure thrower he was at the outset of his career. Take his sequence against Troy Tulowitzki to end the fourth inning after giving up his first base hit of the game to Chris Colabello with two outs: Two knuckle-curves called for strikes, a 96-mph fastball fouled off, then a changeup to get Tulo swinging. He didn't have to finesse the margins, he just flat-out overpowered people with a mix and maybe a little bit of extra credit on the edges of the zone.

2. Stifling the Blue Jays' big-inning opportunity in the sixth inning: How else were the Blue Jays going to get something started against a pitcher as hot as Volquez was, after he sliced through the Jays' lineup his first two times through giving up only four baserunners through the first five innings? By grinding through Volquez's assortment with two nine-pitch, full-count walks created by Josh Donaldson and Jose Bautista to produce the potential to put a crooked number on the board. But then a funny thing happened on the way to that -- Edwin Encarnacion got rung up looking and Chris Colabello flied out, establishing the key at-bat of the game: Tulo vs. Volquez. Even having a shutout going, up by three, this had to be Volquez's last batter. And Tulo didn't look as if he wanted any part of it.

Tulo wanted no part of swinging 3-1

— keithlaw (@keithlaw) October 17, 2015

Volquez threw seven straight fastballs, and Tulo watched the first five to get to 3-2, fouling off a pitch before getting rung up on strike three. As much as Volquez had struggled with location in the inning, this probably wasn't what anybody envisioned from Tulo in the most important at-bat of the game. Say what you want about the umpiring earlier, but it was a clean strike. Whether Tulo was still crossed up over that previous at-bat, or he's still less than 100 percent, or whether you want to turn this into an example of the virtue of guys who can jump on a pitch and do something with what's given to them, it was his big chance to get the Blue Jays on the board before the Royals got into their bullpen, and he didn't deliver.

3. Goins' flip in the sixth inning to Tulo to start a 4-6-3 DP: With token lefty Aaron Loup brought in to face Mike Moustakas with runners on the corners, one out, and a 3-0 deficit looking as if it were about to get bigger still, the Jays' slick-fielding infield delivered the defensive play of the game. With Tulo covering the bag, Goins came in and passed second on an infield chopper up the middle, then flipped the feed to Tulo, who caught it with his bare hand and the out before throwing to first to complete the double play.

What a double play! I just made a weird noise that's something between a squawk and a quack.

— Tao of Stieb (@TaoofStieb) October 17, 2015

4. Plenty going on to make statheads howl: Alcides Escobar leading off despite a career .298 OBP? The big-inning Blue Jays bunting with Goins in the third inning? It wasn't just the matchup providing flashbacks to their last ALCS matchup in 1985, but maybe some of the action too.

I will forever hate the 3rd-inning sac bunt, but Goins isn't hitting at all and terrific bats behind him, at least. #Bluejays #Jays #ALCS

— Mike Wilner (@Wilnerness590) October 17, 2015

In Ned Yost's defense, the team went 82-49 with Escobar leading off this season, compared to 13-18 in the games that statistically sounder-seeming choices such as Alex Gordon or Ben Zobrist led off. So the guy in the dugout didn't mess with success.

And perhaps maddening to some, but redemptive for Royals fans, and entirely consistent with Escobar's tremendous track record on first pitches (.844 OPS in 2015, .791 career), he delivered against a guy in Escobar who's always sure to be in or around the strike zone, doubling on a first-pitch fastball in the first, then plating the Royals' first run in the third by doubling on a first-pitch curve. Add in Salvador Perez's first-pitch homer in the fourth, and the Royals had enough runs to win with, even before they tacked on a couple of insurance runs off LaTroy Hawkins in the eighth.

Every single thing a Kansas City player does during a game is literally Royals baseball.

— Dustin Parkes (@dustinparkes) October 17, 2015

5. Retreads!?! If someone had told you after the 2012 season that Volquez versus Marco Estrada would be the Game 1 matchup in the ALCS, you'd be forgiven if you had to do a spit-take. In 2012, Volquez's ERA was 6.01 while pitching in Petco for the San Diego Padres; Estrada was a swingman who'd done the Milwaukee Brewers a nice turn as the staff's tireless sixth starter. But both provided strong reminders for why, with pitchers, Joaquin Andujar's favorite word in English -- "youneverknow" -- still applies.

It's no coincidence defense helped create Estrada's gaudy 3.13 ERA that's more than a run lower than his fielding-independent FIP (4.40). Put in that context, Estrada probably pitched about as well as a guy who's probably no more than a good rotation's No. 4 guy should, but he nevertheless gave the Blue Jays a game that's normally in reach for their offense. But the postseason isn't the regular season, and if they didn't score against Volquez a third time through the order, odds are they weren't going to score at all having to face Kelvin Herrera and Ryan Madson in the seventh and eighth.

Where Volquez's stuff had disappointed people in the past, he resurrected his career with a strong 2014 spin with the Pittsburgh Pirates while working with guru pitching coach Ray Searage, and between that year and this one, suddenly suggesting that Volquez is a guy you can beat a big-bat lineup like the Blue Jays' in October doesn't seem so implausible, especially now that this win's a matter of history.

Christina Kahrl writes about MLB for ESPN. You can follow her on Twitter.