Game #156 Preview: Manoah vs Jax

The Blue Jays wrap up their series with the Twins in Minneapolis, trying desperately to earn the series split. The game is scheduled to get underway at 2:10 ET.

Blue Jays’ Starter

Alek Manoah will make his 19th start of the season for the Jays, looking to finish strong in what has been an excellent rookie campaign for him. He won’t garner any first place votes for Rookie of the Year, mainly because he didn’t put in a full season while the front runners did, but he can definitely be proud of his 7-2 record and 3.36 ERA over 99.0 innings. There are just a dozen pitchers in baseball with over 100 innings pitched that have a lower ERA than Manoah, a great rookie season that he can build on in the future.

Twins’ Starter

Getting the ball for the Twins will be rookie Griffin Jax, who will be making his 13th start and 17th appearance overall. He hasn’t had a good season in the Majors, posting a 3-4 record with a 6.75 ERA over 72.0 innings. His FIP is right there as well, coming into play at 6.62. He simply doesn’t strike many out (7.50 per 9 innings), walks about league average (3.38 per 9 innings) and gives out home runs in spades (2.63 per 9 innings). That home run rate is easily the worst in all of baseball among pitchers with at least 70 innings, with second place coming in at just 2.27 and league average being 1.26.

Blue Jays’ Lineup

Twins’ Lineup

I’m getting this as the lineup from Fangraphs, but I haven’t seen a Tweet about it yet, so I don’t call it “official”, but this is probably it.

1. Luis Arraez (3B)
2. Byron Buxton (CF)
3. Jorge Polanco (2B)
4. Josh Donaldson (DH)
5. Max Kepler (RF)
6. Mitch Garver (C)
7. Miguel Sano (1B)
8. Nick Gordon (SS)
9. Jake Cave (LF)

Yesterday’s Heroes

Brandon Belt went 3-5 with a pair of home runs and 4 RBI, earning himself the Monster Bat award. He helped his Giants spoil the Rockies’ party for Larry Walker, beating them 7-2.

Giancarlo Stanton hit a huge 8th inning grand slam, helping propel his Yankees to the win over the Red Sox 5-3. For his efforts he gets the WPA King trophy with a .677 mark.

For the second straight day our Pitcher of the Day is someone who threw a Maddux. After Max Fried did it Friday night, Ranger Suarez accomplished the feat yesterday. He threw 9 shutout innings on 97 pitches, allowing just 4 hits and no walks while striking out 7. He also obviously got the win as his Phillies beat the Pirates 3-0.

Find the Link

Find the link between Josh Donaldson and Carlos Carrasco

Stats retrieved from Fangraphs and Baseball Savant