Getting to play terrible teams like the Orioles, Rangers, and Royals has been extremely fun, but now the Jays have a seven-game stretch coming up against the Yankees and Red Sox that’ll test whether or not this team is Actually Good.

Aaron Sanchez has gotten progressively better with each start he’s made in 2018. That’s reasonable given the fact he hadn’t made a Major League start since July 2017 because of that blister issue. In his last outing, Sanchez pitched likely the best game of his career thus far, no hitting the O’s into the eighth inning. The most impressive part of that game is how he navigated a bases loaded situation in the eighth after the O’s broke up the no-no. CC Sabathia will start for the Yankees. It’ll be just his third outing of the season as he’s currently on the 10-day disabled list with a hip injury.

Marco Estrada was carrying a no hitter into the fourth inning his last time out against Baltimore, but then he started experiencing back spasms and imploded. The weekend of rainouts in Cleveland was a blessing for Estrada and his back issues, as he has now had over a week off between starts. In his first outing of the season, he held the Yankees to three runs over seven innings. Sonny Gray has had a rough start to the season, as he’s cleared five innings just once in his three starts. In his first start against Toronto, Gray was only able to go four innings before getting yanked.

Marcus Stroman has had a strange start to his season. In his first game against the Yankees, he was good save for one big inning, then he struggled in Texas in cold weather, and then, in Cleveland, he had a rough start but grinded out five innings despite allowing four runs in the first two. All told, Stroman’s FIP suggests he should be having much better results than his 7.98 ERA would indicate. He’ll go against Jordan Montgomery, who’s had two good starts and one bad start this year. He was very good against the Jays last year, but I wouldn’t put too much stock in comparing results against the 2017 to the 2018 team.

Sunday will be Yankees legend Jaime Garcia’s return to New York. Garcia made eight starts with the Yankees last year and had one appearance with them in the playoffs. Since joining the Jays, Garcia has been excellent. He’s cleared five innings in all three of his starts and hasn’t allowed more than three earned runs in any of them. Luis Severino will get the ball for the Yankees in the finale. Save for one bad start against Boston, Severino has been very, very good this year. In the season opener, he dominated the Jays, one-hitting them over five-and-two-thirds innings.

The Yankees, who I thought were going to just cruise through the season, have had a pretty underwhelming start this year. They’re 8-8, haven’t gotten good starting pitching outside of Luis Severino, the bullpen hasn’t been automatic like you’d expect, and their lineup has been just good but not great. The offence is being carried by Aaron Judge and Didi Gregorious, while Giancarlo Stanton has had a rough introduction to life in a market where people actually give a shit about baseball. The Yankees are still quite good and I don’t think this poor start means much, but this is a great opportunity for the Jays to make up some games on them before they inevitably get rolling.