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Series Preview: The Trash Birds!

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Cam Lewis
6 years ago
Back-to-back dives through the dumpster! The Jays cleaned up the garbage in Texas, taking two of three from the Rangers, now they’ll be in Baltimore to take on the Trash Birds for the first time in 2018.

Monday at 7:05 ET

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J.A. Happ has had a couple of gritty starts to begin the season. In both of them, he’s had success getting guys to strike out, but he’s struggled with a high pitch count and has yet to make it out of the sixth inning. Through 10 innings, he’s struck out 14 and he’s walked just two, which is always a good sign. He’ll go against Dylan Bundy who’s been near perfect so far this season. Bundy sports a nice 0.69 ERA as he’s allowed just one run on 10 hits and three walks through 13 innings pitched. Last season, Bundy was dominant against the Jays, scattering just two earned runs over three starts.

Tuesday at 7:05 ET

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Aaron Sanchez has shown flashes of brilliance in his first two starts though his results don’t necessarily reflect it. In both starts, Sanchez looked dirty, tossing a change up that made hitters look like little leaguers and reaching the mid-90s with his fastball with ease. The issue, though, for Sanchez has been running out of gas as time goes along. That’s expected for somebody who barely made any starts last season. Andrew Cashner, one of Baltimore’s big free agent adds from the off-season, will make the start against Sanchez. He had one bad start against Minnesota to kick off the season but he rebounded with a strong start against the Yankees in his second outing. Casher made one start against the Jays when he was on the Rangers last season, holding Toronto to one run over seven innings.

Wednesday at 7:05 ET

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After an up-and-down season in 2017, we’re back to saying “fuck yeah, Marco Estrada starts.” Estrada looks like the team’s ace early on this season. He dominated Texas on Friday night and was solid against the Yankees in his season debut. He’ll go against Kevin Gausman, who hasn’t been good so far this year. Gausman got drilled for six runs over four innings by the Twins in his season debut and then allowed two runs in five innings against the Yankees after that. Gausman made six starts against the Jays last year and held them to a 1.51 ERA, which is incredible given the fact he had a 4.68 ERA for the season.

Thoughts…

The O’s got off to a really, really bad start. They lost two of three to the Twins and then got pounded by the Astros. But they managed to take three of four from the supposedly unbeatable Yankees including  come-from-behind win after they allowed five runs in the first inning. So, which version of the team should we expect? The Yankee bullpen has been horrendous this season and the O’s capitalized on it, but they struggled to score runs against both Minnesota and Houston.
This is a series, like with the Rangers, in which the Jays really should be taking two of three.

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