ST: Jays @ Orioles, June 12-15

[CrymeTime]

Game 1: 7:05 PM
Mark Buehrle (10-2, 2.04 ERA) VS Kevin Gausman (1-1, 4.91 ERA)

Game 2: 7:05 PM
Drew Hutchison (4-4, 3.96 ERA) VS Ubaldo Jimenez (2-7, 5.01 ERA)

Game 3: 4:05 PM
R.A. Dickey (6-4, 4.20 ERA) VS Bud Norris (5-5, 3.94 ERA)

Game 4: 1:35 PM
J.A. Happ (5-3, 4.37 ERA) VS Chris Tillman (5-3, 4.91 ERA)




When do you think Rasmus will make his return?

[bringbackhoffa]

Predicting we win games 1 and 4, and Rasmus returns and we see Lawrie starting at third base for all 4 games.

[duppyy]

Must win series.

[Waylanderz]

Time to make a statement!

[nonc]

split! split! split! split!

[Ado05]

Statement series for sure.

[SharoneWright]

3-1 here more than makes up for the previous 2-4....

[CapeCrusader]

Normally I would get exited for a match up vs guys like Ubaldo and Gausman. But we saw how it was vs Correia, so you never know. Hopefully Buehrle continues to be...Buehrle and Hutch can play like he did in Texas and Detroit.

[Santoki]

CrymeTime living up to his name by creating this series thread. And, what's with the poll?

[uniballer]

Hopefully the bats wake up. Very important series

[Michael Bradley]

With the bats as cold as they are, I'm not sure what to think of any of the match-ups. When the Jays are on, they can hit anyone. When they're cold, it gets really ugly.

Take it game by game. The goal is always to win every series.

[CrymeTime]

CrymeTime living up to his name by creating this series thread. And, what's with the poll?

LOL, I just thought something simple could help turn it around.


The Jays are in Cincinnati next week, so I thought I'd get a preview of how people feel about the NL style of play.


------


My game-by-game prediction:
7-3, W
5-4, L (13 innings)
11-3, W
4-3, W (10 innings)

[Santoki]

CrymeTime living up to his name by creating this series thread. And, what's with the poll?

My game-by-game prediction:
7-3, W
5-4, L (13 innings)
11-3, W
4-3, W (10 innings)

Oddly specific predictions there, but 3/4 would be nice.

[KillaSham23]

Can the bats wake up already? So frustrating to watch right now.

[Graham's Cracker]

Looking ahead, the Blue Jays are facing a long, tough road trip. They'll play four in Baltimore before heading to the Bronx for three against the Yankees and conclude with three in Cincinnati. You know what I see, though? Opportunities galore for the offense to get going again.

First up, the Orioles are 11th in the AL in ERA and allow home runs at the second-highest rate in the AL. The Blue Jays also avoid the Orioles' best starter, Wei-Yin Chen, in the four-gamer.

Next, Toronto will head to the easiest park in the majors in which to homer this season while facing the only team in the majors to have allowed more homers than the Orioles, in the Yankees.

If we expand the search of home runs allowed amongst pitching staffs to include the entire MLB, guess who sits between the Orioles and Yankees? Yes, the Reds (fifth-worst in baseball), who play in the second-best homer park this season in Great American Ball Park.

As for the sentiment that the Blue Jays have been overachieving, lots of factors say otherwise. They have a plus-35 run differential, a relatively average strength of schedule, a FIP that isn't much different than their ERA and they haven't been overly lucky on batted balls in play.

The Blue Jays to this point may well have been a fluke, but I doubt it. The smart money is on them bouncing back offensively very soon and having a good enough road trip to come home still in first place in the AL East.

http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/eye-on-baseball/24586071/the-week-in-overreactions-blue-jays-begin-their-descent

[Raptor_Guy]

Win here would be huge.

[Dan2087]

I have a good feeling about the series

Game 1 - Jays win 4-2
Game 2 - Jays win 5-4
Game 3 - Jays win 7-6
Game 4 - Jays lose 5-1

[dballislife]

gotta win this series, at least a split...and even if we lose, at least compete in them jeeze, we've been losing some ugly ones

[Boogie!]

i'm scared guys...

[s e n s i]

Looking ahead, the Blue Jays are facing a long, tough road trip. They'll play four in Baltimore before heading to the Bronx for three against the Yankees and conclude with three in Cincinnati. You know what I see, though? Opportunities galore for the offense to get going again.

First up, the Orioles are 11th in the AL in ERA and allow home runs at the second-highest rate in the AL. The Blue Jays also avoid the Orioles' best starter, Wei-Yin Chen, in the four-gamer.

Next, Toronto will head to the easiest park in the majors in which to homer this season while facing the only team in the majors to have allowed more homers than the Orioles, in the Yankees.

If we expand the search of home runs allowed amongst pitching staffs to include the entire MLB, guess who sits between the Orioles and Yankees? Yes, the Reds (fifth-worst in baseball), who play in the second-best homer park this season in Great American Ball Park.

As for the sentiment that the Blue Jays have been overachieving, lots of factors say otherwise. They have a plus-35 run differential, a relatively average strength of schedule, a FIP that isn't much different than their ERA and they haven't been overly lucky on batted balls in play.

The Blue Jays to this point may well have been a fluke, but I doubt it. The smart money is on them bouncing back offensively very soon and having a good enough road trip to come home still in first place in the AL East.

http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/eye-on-baseball/24586071/the-week-in-overreactions-blue-jays-begin-their-descent

that is a surprisingly rational assessment of the jays coming from a major american media outlet