Dodgers (16-11) vs Blue Jays (13-13)
After escaping a wet, cold and windy hell yesterday and returning to the land of the domed sky, the Blue Jays will find another hell waiting for them, the NL West behemoth Dodgers. The Blue Jays kick off a three game set against the division leaders, hoping to put an end to their longest losing streak of the season. After a week of later gametimes with some west coast and central time zones, tonight’s game is back on at a normal time, the typical 7:07 ET start.
Blue Jays’ Starter
Chris Bassitt will look to play stopper for the Jays, trying to end this modest three game losing streak. Bassitt comes into play today with a 2-3 record and a 3.90 ERA, a bit higher of an ERA than he is used to.
It is Bassitt’s FIP that is really out of line for him, entering the day with it sitting up at 4.77, nearly a run higher than his career average. He has gotten to that point while struggling a bit with each of the facets of FIP, striking out just 21.5% of batters, his lowest mark since the pandemic season. His walk rate is 11.6%, his highest ever. And his home run rate is also the highest it has been in a few years. All of that is certainly concerning for the 35 year old, but the one typical marker of a pitcher in decline in his mid-30s, diminished velocity, is not there, as he is throwing as hard as he has at pretty much any point in his career.
Dodgers’ Starter
The Dodgers will go with 25 year old rookie Gavin Stone, a right hander with a hard sinker and a great changeup. Stone has struggled in his time in the Majors though, putting up a 6.00 ERA through 18 innings this year, and a 9.00 ERA through 31 innings last year. His biggest culprit this year has been the walks, giving up 10 of them already. But one thing he has avoided so far is giving up any home runs, with none allowed through his 4 starts. That’s in pretty stark contrast to last season where he allowed 8 home runs in 8 appearances.
Stone throws his changeup a lot, more than any of his other pitches. He pairs his change with a fastball and a sinker, mixing in the occasional cutter and slider, and even more occasionally a curveball. All of these sit higher than league average in terms of velocity, with his fastballs coming in around 95 mph. His changeup averages 87 mph, not quite getting the ideal separation in speed, and likely part of why he is struggling in the Majors.
Blue Jays’ Lineup
It was a very rough end of the road trip for this group, and while the weather yesterday likely hurt their production a bit, they just haven’t been good in general. As a team they’re hitting .231/.317/.369, but Fangraphs does give them a generous 104 wRC+. Their .137 ISO (difference between slugging and average) is tied for the 10th lowest mark in the game, and their 3.69 runs/game is the 6th lowest.
Addison Barger is hopefully going to be back in the lineup today with a righty on the mound, and hopefully he’ll be playing a position that he actually has experience in. If he can find some success and consistent playing time, the Jays could theoretically have three above average lefty bats in the latter half of their lineup, provided Varsho can keep up his hot streak and Biggio can remember he has a bat – a 1-13 road trip with 7 strikeouts was rough.
It was great to see George Springer find some extra base hits the other day. He has run his wRC+ up to pretty much league average again, nowhere near where he needs to be, but getting better. Bo Bichette is still doing poorly, and unlike Vladdy, Bo doesn’t have promising expected stats either. Just a rough month for Bo, and hopefully something we’ll have forgotten about by the time summer rolls around.
Dodgers’ Lineup
As much as the Jays’ lineup has been sucking, the Dodgers’ lineup has been raking. Their .269/.350/.434 gives them the third highest wRC+ in all of baseball at 122. They’re 7th in runs scored with 5.22 per game and don’t really have much for weak spots.
Mookie Betts is leading the charge, putting up the highest fWAR in the league at 2.3. He is batting .374/.477/.636 (209 wRC+), and in case you have forgotten, the 31 year old has decided to play a new position this year. He hasn’t seen the outfield grass this season, instead making 8 starts at second base while the bulk of his work has been at SS, where he has made 19 starts. And in true Mookie Betts fashion, he has +3 DRS there already. Other metrics don’t like him as much, particularly UZR where his -2.4 runs is the third worst of any shortstop in the game, ahead of only Elly De La Cruz and Oneil Cruz.
The Dodgers are also getting ridiculous early returns from their prized offseason addition, Shohei Ohtani. Ohtani is hitting .358/.419/.670 (197 wRC+), with 6 home runs and a remarkable 14 doubles – 5 more than anyone else.
The rest of the lineup is doing well as well, as Freddie Freeman (141 wRC+), Will Smith the catcher (141), old friend Teoscar Hernández (127), Max Muncy (125) and even the light hitting Miguel Rojas (121, despite a career 82 mark) are all off to great starts to the season. Add in rookie Andy Pages (136) and there really aren’t any weak spots in this lineup.
Yesterday’s Heroes
Canadian Edouard Julien went 2-4 with a pair of solo home runs, good enough to take home the Monster Bat award. His big day helped the Twins take down the White Sox 6-3.
Gary Sánchez hit a two out, two run home run in the top of the 8th inning to turn around a 1 run deficit. Hits like that are WPA fodder, and he gets the WPA King trophy with a .477 mark. His Brewers would hold on for the win, beating the Pirates 7-5.
A quick interesting WPA note: How does it work for a rain shortened game? Typically WPA is calculated based on the inning the game is in and how each play gets a team closer or further from winning, with live scoring expecting the game to end after 9 innings. When Bobby Witt Jr. grounded out to end the bottom of the 5th, it ended up being the final play of the game, and he was just awarded +.308 WPA for an inning ending groundout that stranded a runner on 3B. But since the game ended after that, he gets the final WPA jump to the win. I doubt Fangraphs changes anything retroactively, but it’s interesting to see.
Zack Wheeler had a dominating effort on the mound again yesterday, going 6 shutout innings while allowing just 1 hit to take home the Pitcher of the Day award. He did walk 4 batters though, so it wasn’t all great. But he still got the win in the Phillies’ 5-0 win over the Reds.
Find the Link
Find the link between Mookie Betts and Bill Russell.