GDB 4.0: Toronto Blue Jays open second series of the year against the Kansas City Royals

After a triumphant comeback in game one of the season, it was heartbreak in games two and three leaving the Toronto Blue Jays 1-2 to start the year.

Saturday, game two, saw the Jays and Kevin Gausman be once again unable to appeal to the baseball gods going hitless until the 8th ultimately falling 4-1. This, mind you, came after the team had more than enough chances to drive in some runs in thanks to Jack Flaherty issuing seven walks across 5.0 IP.

Sunday, meanwhile, was a disaster from the start. The Jays couldn’t get on base in the top of the 1st, then Chris Bassitt got annihilated on the mound. In B1, he allowed home runs to Brendan Donovan, Alec Burleson, and Nolan Gorman, as well as singles to Paul Goldschmidt and Wilson Contreras. It was ugly, and his day didn’t get much better, either. Through it, he allowed four homers, and nine earned runs off 10 hits. He didn’t walk a single batter, nor strike one out as he lasted just 3.1 innings.

Credit to the bullpen as they held the Cards to no more runs, but it was too much for the Jays offence to overcome.

Now, they turn the page to series two of the year visiting the Kansas City Royals as Jose Berrios gets his first start of the year. We’ll talk about this a bit more down below, but he’s a guy who could be in for a nice bounce-back year. He struggled in his first full season with the Jays last year, and this could be a great spot for him against a Royals team with a flaccid offence.

Betano is projecting this game to have lots of offence with the Jays as modest favourites.

First pitch: 7:40 p.m. EST

Weather: 22C. 8 MPH NNE winds. (RotoGrinders)

Moneyline: TOR -125; KCR +105.
O/U: 7.5 — o7.5 -128; u8.5 +105.

TOR: Jose Berrios, RHP — 0-0, -.- ERA, -.- WHIP.

STL: Brady Singer, RHP — 0-0, -.- ERA, -.- WHIP.

The aforementioned Jose Berrios takes the mound for the first time of the season tonight. He’s coming off his worst year in the bigs. Despite a 12-7 record in his 32 starts, his 5.23 ERA, 4.55 FIP and 1.419 WHIP were all career lows. His baseball savant percentile rankings were among the worst in the league, so let’s see if he can get things back on track starting tonight.

On the otherside, we get a look at Brady Singer tonight. the 26-year-old rightie is coming off his best year in the bigs and is entering his fourth season. Last year, he started 24 games going 10-5 with a 3.23 ERA, 3.58 FIP and 1.141 WHIP. He appeared twice against the Jays seeing just 44 batters allowing 10 hits and a 3.67 ERA.

Tune into the latest edition of Blue Jays Nation Radio as the crew makes 23 predictions ahead of the 2023 season.