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Game #156 Preview: Blue Jays @ Orioles

By Scott C.
Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports

The Blue Jays soar into Baltimore on the back of a spectacular Sunday afternoon walk-off home run by Josh Donaldson against the Rays. The team is four games ahead of New York for the division lead and tied with the Kansas City Royals for the best record in the American League. Baltimore, meanwhile, just got embarrassed in Boston in spectacular fashion. The O's were shut out in three straight games while allowing 17 runs against the Red Sox this weekend and limp back home hoping to touch the plate tonight for the first time since Thursday against Washington. The team sits at 76-79, which is just good enough for third in the division although Boston will probably overtake them before the year is through.

On offence, Chris Davis and Manny Machado have been good....that's pretty much it. On the mound, the rotation has been a mess with no clear #1 at all except maybe Wei-Yin Chen? The team just hasn't been that good at all this season and without big improvement, likely won't contend next year either. The best part of today is that the Blue Jays get to face Chris Tillman, which should make every Blue Jays fan very, very happy. The righty has made five starts against Toronto this year and...well if you sort his game log by earned runs allowed you get this:

Tillman

via Baseball Reference

Yes it's true, Tillman has made 29 starts this year and nearly all of the worst ones have comes against our Blue Jays. It's easy to see why, with the righty throwing a bunch of hittable fastballs that the Jays sluggers just feast on. Tillman actually doesn't allow that many home runs overall, but when he faces Toronto he's good for at least two or three.

Marco Estrada goes for the boys in blue tonight, making it a rematch of the September 6 contest, which the Blue Jays won 10-4. Despite all of the stats pointing in Toronto's favour, the team isn't that big of a favourite tonight which makes you wonder if someone knows something more than we do down in Vegas.

Hopeful Lineup

Chris Colabello must have done something to seriously anger the powers that be, but I'm still hopeful he'll get a start eventually.

  1. Ben Revere LF
  2. Josh Donaldson 3B
  3. Jose Bautista RF
  4. Edwin Encarnacion DH
  5. Chris Colabello 1B
  6. Russell Martin C
  7. Ryan Goins SS
  8. Kevin Pillar CF
  9. Cliff Pennington 2B

Bullpen Usage

Liam Hendriks likely won't be available after yesterday's strong effort, but there's more than enough arms in the bullpen this time of year.

Find The Link

Find the link between Chris Tillman and the model that Oprah Winfrey asked to rub their face against her's.

That was a weird FTL...Anyway, let's see if Vegas knows more than we do or if this will be as easy as it looks tonight.

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