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After 36 series the Guardians finally play the Blue Jays in a four-game series at the Prog. These teams are trains passing in the night. The Jays are 63-50, in third place in the wild card race, and have won 7 of their last 11. They are coming off a sweep of the Red Sox in Fenway. The Guardians have lost 7 of 9, have fallen a whopping 4.5 games behind the Twins, just traded their best starter, and their leading RBI man is out. On top of that it's likely their best player and closer will both be suspended by the time the game starts.
So it looks like the Guardians are going to get a butt kicking at the hands of the surging Jays this week. The Guardians will be sending three rookies (Williams, Bibee, and Logan) to the mound along with a reclamation project (Syndergaard). With Tyler Freeman on the injured list and Jose probably suspended we will be seeing a lot of Arias, Rocchio, and even Tena this week. David Fry apparently has a hand injury - I don't know about his availability to play first base. We could see an infield of Arias at 1st, Gimenenz at 2nd, and Rocchio and Tena at short and 3rd or vice versa.
Throw in Bo Naylor and the three rookie starters and we're basically seeing the May, 2023 Columbus Clippers playing Toronto this week.
However, the Guardians could steal a game or two. The Jays will start 35-year-old lefty Hyun Jin Ryu tonight. Ryu had Tommy John surgery last year and this will be his second start. Six days ago Ryu went five innings against the O's, allowing nine hits and four runs. He threw 80 pitches. The Guardians have never been able to hit soft-tossing lefties, so I won't be surprised if Ryu shuts them down for six innings tonight, but they do have a chance against a guy who is still getting up to speed after major arm surgery.
In his start last week Ryu threw 41% fastballs averaging 89.2 mph so the Guardians basically have no chance against a guy who throws this slow. The rest of his pitches were evenly divided between a 78 mph changeup and a 71 mph curve.
Gavin Williams is 1-3 with a 3.38 ERA. Fangraphs has his expected ERA at 4.53 and his xFIP at 4.96 so they think he's been helped considerably by his defense and maybe some BABIP luck. Williams is really coming along, having allowed just five earned runs in his last four starts covering 18 innings (2.50 ERA). His problem is pitch count as he has only lasted 4-5 innings in each start. He also has walked 14 batters in his last 18 innings.
So it will be an aging soft-tossing lefty against a rookie right-hander with a 96 mph fastball tonight in a battle of young and old, left and right, fast and slow. The Jays' crafty old lefty trying to make a comeback from major arm surgery against a slew of Guardian rookie hitters getting their first look at his bag of tricks.
Tuesday will feature a really good pitching matchup as another Jays' lefty, Yusei Kukuchi (9-3, 3.67) goes against Tanner Bibee (7-2, 3.14). Who would have believed Bibee, who started the season in Columbus, would lead the Guardians in wins going into August and have a lower ERA than Bieber?
The last two games will feature RHP Kevin Gausman (8-6, 3.20) versus Logan Allen (5-4, 3.65) and RHP Alek Manoah (3-8, 5.72) versus Noah Syndergaard (1-5, 6.75). Manoah only has four quality starts this year out of 18 and obviously that 5.72 ERA is not impressive. However, he missed a month and has been decent (4.26 ERA) in his five starts since returning.
Toronto ranks 14th in scoring overall, but they average 4.09 runs per game at home and 5.00 on the road - an odd reverse split. They're the ninth highest scoring team on the road so Syndergaard and the three rookies will be challenged.
The Jays rank 4th in ERA but are much better at home, suggesting their ballpark is very pitcher friendly. They rank 9th in road ERA, so away from home they rank 9th in both scoring and preventing runs. No wonder they're 63-50 in baseball's toughest division.
SS Bo Bichette leads the Jays with a line of .321/.847. He leads the AL in batting average and is fourth highest in the majors. The Jays have eight players in double figures for home runs. They've hit 133 dingers this year compared to 84 for the Guardians. And without Josh Naylor and Jose Ramirez there is a legitimate question as to whether we will see ANY home runs from the Guardians in this series. I'd put the over/under at three.
So, sit back and enjoy. I will be watching to see how the rookie starters fare against a top ten scoring team and how the rookie infielders look. We probably won't have Clase but I doubt we'll need a closer in this series.
So it looks like the Guardians are going to get a butt kicking at the hands of the surging Jays this week. The Guardians will be sending three rookies (Williams, Bibee, and Logan) to the mound along with a reclamation project (Syndergaard). With Tyler Freeman on the injured list and Jose probably suspended we will be seeing a lot of Arias, Rocchio, and even Tena this week. David Fry apparently has a hand injury - I don't know about his availability to play first base. We could see an infield of Arias at 1st, Gimenenz at 2nd, and Rocchio and Tena at short and 3rd or vice versa.
Throw in Bo Naylor and the three rookie starters and we're basically seeing the May, 2023 Columbus Clippers playing Toronto this week.
However, the Guardians could steal a game or two. The Jays will start 35-year-old lefty Hyun Jin Ryu tonight. Ryu had Tommy John surgery last year and this will be his second start. Six days ago Ryu went five innings against the O's, allowing nine hits and four runs. He threw 80 pitches. The Guardians have never been able to hit soft-tossing lefties, so I won't be surprised if Ryu shuts them down for six innings tonight, but they do have a chance against a guy who is still getting up to speed after major arm surgery.
In his start last week Ryu threw 41% fastballs averaging 89.2 mph so the Guardians basically have no chance against a guy who throws this slow. The rest of his pitches were evenly divided between a 78 mph changeup and a 71 mph curve.
Gavin Williams is 1-3 with a 3.38 ERA. Fangraphs has his expected ERA at 4.53 and his xFIP at 4.96 so they think he's been helped considerably by his defense and maybe some BABIP luck. Williams is really coming along, having allowed just five earned runs in his last four starts covering 18 innings (2.50 ERA). His problem is pitch count as he has only lasted 4-5 innings in each start. He also has walked 14 batters in his last 18 innings.
So it will be an aging soft-tossing lefty against a rookie right-hander with a 96 mph fastball tonight in a battle of young and old, left and right, fast and slow. The Jays' crafty old lefty trying to make a comeback from major arm surgery against a slew of Guardian rookie hitters getting their first look at his bag of tricks.
Tuesday will feature a really good pitching matchup as another Jays' lefty, Yusei Kukuchi (9-3, 3.67) goes against Tanner Bibee (7-2, 3.14). Who would have believed Bibee, who started the season in Columbus, would lead the Guardians in wins going into August and have a lower ERA than Bieber?
The last two games will feature RHP Kevin Gausman (8-6, 3.20) versus Logan Allen (5-4, 3.65) and RHP Alek Manoah (3-8, 5.72) versus Noah Syndergaard (1-5, 6.75). Manoah only has four quality starts this year out of 18 and obviously that 5.72 ERA is not impressive. However, he missed a month and has been decent (4.26 ERA) in his five starts since returning.
Toronto ranks 14th in scoring overall, but they average 4.09 runs per game at home and 5.00 on the road - an odd reverse split. They're the ninth highest scoring team on the road so Syndergaard and the three rookies will be challenged.
The Jays rank 4th in ERA but are much better at home, suggesting their ballpark is very pitcher friendly. They rank 9th in road ERA, so away from home they rank 9th in both scoring and preventing runs. No wonder they're 63-50 in baseball's toughest division.
SS Bo Bichette leads the Jays with a line of .321/.847. He leads the AL in batting average and is fourth highest in the majors. The Jays have eight players in double figures for home runs. They've hit 133 dingers this year compared to 84 for the Guardians. And without Josh Naylor and Jose Ramirez there is a legitimate question as to whether we will see ANY home runs from the Guardians in this series. I'd put the over/under at three.
So, sit back and enjoy. I will be watching to see how the rookie starters fare against a top ten scoring team and how the rookie infielders look. We probably won't have Clase but I doubt we'll need a closer in this series.
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