Judge, Soto, Guerrero Will Help Get Over Total

Yankees vs. Blue Jays, 7:00 ET

The AL East has been an interesting division for a multitude of reasons and that won’t change today as the Yankees take on the Blue Jays. We have a division with arguably the two best teams in the American League (the Yankees and Orioles) and then three other teams that have potential to make some noise if they go on a nice run and find a way to make the playoffs (the Red Sox, Rays, and Blue Jays. The division certainly won’t be decided today, and the playoffs won’t either, but it is interesting to think about the possibilities as two of the club square off.

The Yankees enter today’s game with a superb record and everything going well for them. They’ve gotten great seasons from both of their superstars, Aaron Judge and Juan Soto, and outside of an injury to Gerrit Cole and Anthony Rizzo, the team has been fairly healthy. That was an issue last year, and it clearly impacted them as the team went down the tubes almost as soon as Judge was out of the lineup. This season he is an absolute monster with 30 homers, a .309 average and 77 RBIs. Any team would suffer without his production, but it was wild to see just how much it dropped last year. The pitching was also an issue last year that seems to have resolved itself. So far, the team is throwing the ball rather well and I think tinker, rather than big moves is the route for them this year at the trade deadline. Perhaps they will try and get a flamethrower for the pen, but that remains to be seen. One addition that has worked out rather well is today’s starter, Marcus Stroman. Stroman comes into the game with a  3.15 ERA and a 1.26 WHIP, both solid numbers and something that he is expected to do. This has been his worst month of the season, but there isn’t any true reason to not trust him. He still has turned in two good outings to go with two sub-par ones. He faced the Blue Jays once this year and went 5.1 innings and allowed two earned runs in a 6-4 Yankee win.

Toronto Blue Jays 1B Vladimir Guerrero Jr. daps up 2B Cavan Biggio after hitting a home run vs. the Tampa Bay Rays at Tropicana Field. (Kim Klement Neitzel-USA TODAY Sports)

The Blue Jays are not in the same boat as the Yankees. To me, they’ve been rather disappointing for the season. I actually like their team and roster, but the production just isn’t there. You can say it is because they are in a tough division, or that it is an underperformance, but whatever the reason, the club is not playing as well as they should. Toronto has been under .500 for almost the entire season and has no real reason for optimism at this point. To make matters worse, there is a lot of speculation that Vladimir Guerrero Jr. could soon be on the same side as today’s opposition. I don’t quite think that the team will trade him within their own division, but the Yankees are certainly looking to go all in so they might make an offer that can’t be refused. Today the Blue Jays send out starter Yusei Kikuchi to the hill. He’s been decent for them this season overall with a 4.00 ERA and a 1.33 WHIP. Kikuchi started the year strong and we were making some money on him. He had a sub-3 ERA until the end of May and it has been going up ever since. He has allowed 14 earned runs this month over three starts that covered just 11.1 innings. The other two starts were stellar with just one earned run allowed over 11 innings. He did face the Yankees twice already and the Blue Jays won both games. He was pitching better at that time and allowed just one earned run over 11.1 innings against them in two starts. 

I expect this game to hit the over. Neither pitcher is pitching all that well currently. Kikuchi has been good in two starts against the Yankees, but it feels like it is just a matter of time before we start to see some problems arise for him. Stroman has been a bit inconsistent of late and I expect the Blue Jays to probably find a way to get a few runs off of him. Back the over in this one. 

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