Series Preview: Can the Blue Jays Tame the Tigers?

Jun 30, 2015; Toronto, Ontario, CAN; Toronto Blue Jays starting pitcher Marco Estrada (25) delivers a pitch against Boston Red Sox at Rogers Centre. Mandatory Credit: Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports

Game 3: Marco Estrada (5-4, 3.58 ERA) vs Justin Verlander (0-1, 5.09 ERA)

Marco Estrada is certainly enjoying a coming of age type of season. There were many groans and grumbles when he was slipped into the rotation. He got a little thump in his last start but his stats tell the story of a guy who is just able to get hitters out. In general the opposition is hitting just .210 off of him and his WHIP is 1.15.  His percentage of pitches that are strikes is 65%.

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He knows how to keep the ball around the plate and his ability to give up too many home runs is doing much better this year (10 in 75 innings pitched). If he continues to shine, we’ll have three sort of soft tossers in the rotation which goes against the norm…but only because of necessity, not choice.

Verlander is slowly coming along after coming off the injured list 3 starts ago. His ERA is above 5 and he has walked more than he has struck out.  He is having trouble keeping his pitch counts low in each inning so far but has tossed at least 5 innings in all three starts so far. Is he going to be the ace that he has been in the last few years? It’s tough to tell but all signs point to a regression so that leaves the Tigers without a bona fide number 1. You think they want Max Scherzer back? Yeah I thought so…

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