Game #58 Preview: Gausman vs Brieske

After a romp last night, the Blue Jays continue their series against the Tigers this afternoon. Gametime is set for 4:10 ET.

Blue Jays’ Starter

Kevin Gausman heads to the mound, looking to rebound from easily his worst start of the season. Last time out against the Twins, Gausman got knocked around for 5 runs on 9 hits over just 3.2 innings. There was a lot of discussion about him tipping his pitches, and he pretty much had to give up on his splitter. He undoubtedly has spent the time in between working on that issue, so hopefully it’s not a concern today.

That bad outing has pushed Gausman’s season line to 5-4 with a 2.78 ERA. He still has the Major’s best FIP at 1.60, and he still leads all pitchers in fWAR at 2.9, but the field is getting closer than it was a couple weeks ago. He has allowed a couple home runs over his last few starts, and after not surrendering a walk in his first 5 games, he has now allowed at least 1 in his last 6 starts.

Tigers’ Starter

Rookie Beau Brieske will get the ball for the Tigers, making his ninth start of the season and of his career. So far in his young career, he is 0-5 with a 4.93 ERA. His FIP paints an even worse story though, coming in at a 6.54 mark. He has been hit hard, giving up 12 home runs in his 42 innings of work, with his 2.57 HR/9 rate being the second worst in all of baseball among the 122 pitchers with at least 40 innings. On top of the home runs, he doesn’t strike out many, and has a 29-15 strikeout to walk ratio.

Blue Jays’ Lineup

Happy Gabriel Moreno day to all! Such a wonderful birthday present to me too!

Tigers’ Lineup

Yesterday’s Heroes

Six different players hit two home runs last night, with either 2 or 3 RBI. Out of all of them, only one of them was playing the Rays, so I’m giving the Monster Bat award to Byron Buxton. He has now hit multiple home runs against an AL East team on back to back days, this time helping his Twins beat the Rays 9-4.

Clarke Schmidt (Yankees) and Brandon Hughes (Cubs) are the co-winners of the WPA King trophy. They both threw 2 shutout innings in extras yesterday, keeping the other side off the board long enough for the Yankees to finally win 2-1 in 13 innings. I think it was the longest game in the Manfred Man era. Schmidt and Hughes both put up a .609 WPA.

Paul Blackburn threw 8 shutout innings, allowing just 4 hits and a walk while striking out 3 to pick up the Pitcher of the Day award. He didn’t get the win though, as the A’s bullpen blew it giving up 3 in the bottom of the 9th to lose 3-2 to the Guardians.

Find the Link

Find the link between Victor Reyes and Niuman Romero.

Stats retrieved from Fangraphs and Baseball Savant