Needless to say, this season has been full of surprises for the Blue Jays.

Who would have guessed a few months ago that at this point in the year Esmil Rogers and Chien-Ming Wang would be key contributors to the starting rotation, Brett Cecil would be among the league’s most dominant relievers and Adam Lind would be the club’s best hitter?

Equally surprising, given the expectations raised by the off-season upgrades, is that even after an eight-game winning streak the Jays are still a game under .500 on the last day of spring.

But few are thinking of their ugly start now, as the Jays continued their winning ways on Wednesday night, sweeping the Colorado Rockies with a 5-2 victory in front of an announced crowd of 27,235 to extend their winning streak to eight games, the longest active run in the majors.

It marks the first time the Jays have swept back-to-back series since September 2008, which is also the last time they strung together a winning streak as long as this one.

Wednesday also marked the seventh straight game in which Jays pitchers have allowed two or fewer earned runs, the most encouraging sign of their recent turnaround.

While the big-money former all-stars drew all the off-season attention, the Jays are winning now thanks in part to remarkable performances from a bunch of former misfits.

Lind, who cleared waivers and was shunted to the minors just a year ago, continued to swing the hottest bat in the Jays lineup, clubbing his ninth home run of the season in the first inning to give the Jays an early 3-0 lead.

One of the biggest question marks heading into the season, Lind is hitting .340 on the season and has been among the top hitters in the game over the past month.

Starter Mark Buehrle did not have his best stuff, but he battled throughout his five innings, limiting the damage to just a pair of runs.

That enabled Jays manager John Gibbons to turn to his bullpen, which has been stellar all season, but dominant of late.

Perhaps most telling of the bullpen’s success this year is that the Jays are the only team in the majors that is undefeated when leading after seven innings — a perfect 26-0.

Gibbons spoke of his trust in the Jays’ bullpen, which has worked more innings than any other in the majors.

“If we’ve got a lead late, we’ve got so many options down there, so many different combinations we can go. They’ve been tremendous,” Gibbons said.

Cecil, the former starter who, like Lind, spent parts of last season in the minors, has been the most remarkable surprise.

The 26-year-old lefty extended his scoreless streak to 17.2 innings on Wednesday with 1-2-3 seventh. He threw just nine pitches, all of them strikes. He also set a new Jays record for consecutive batters faced without allowing a hit at 38. David Cone had the previous record at 36.

Subtract an intentional walk from his last outing and he has been perfect through his last nine innings.

“We’re a bunch of no-namers that can pitch,” said closer Casey Janssen — who earned his 16th save on Wednesday — of the team’s unheralded relief corps. “We got a lot of guys that are talented down there, but we haven’t got the national looks and we’re not getting talked about.”

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Though they are beginning to climb out of the morass they sunk themselves into in the first two months of the season, the Jays’ biggest test will come in their next 10-game stretch as they go up against Baltimore, Tampa Bay and Boston, all divisional rivals.

Before then they will enjoy Thursday’s off-day, content in their recent success.

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