Indians carry winning streak into Toronto to face Blue Jays: Series Preview

Game Two: July 1 – 1:07 pm ET

Josh Tomlin (9-1, 3.32 ERA, 4.86 FIP) vs.
Marcus Stroman (6-4, 5.33 ERA, 4.05 FIP)

The story of Marcus Stroman this year is a hard one to listen to. This is a young man who exerts an extreme amount of confidence and energy, and you really want to see a kid like this exceed, but that’s been far from the case this year.

Why? Well, that’s been hard to distinguish. I still believe it’s a pitch selection/repertoire issue, as his most successful time as a big leaguer came when he was actively mixing pitches in all situations and locations. He’s become too sinker heavy, and hitters are whaling on it.

Another problem I see when he pitches is the lack of differentiation between his two breaking pitches. They come in on the same plane, making it easier for hitters to distinguish spin and attack breaking ball in the zone. If he were to separate the two offerings, hitters would not only have to see spin, but see what kind of spin in order to guess what kind of break it will have.

It makes a hitters job incredibly difficult when a pitcher has multiple breaking balls that separate on different planes.

He’s a work in progress right now, as unfortunate as it is to say. There are clearly some issues here, and every step in the right direction is a good thing, so hopefully we can see some of those from Stroman in this one.

Tomlin is a guy who will rely on strong command and pitch diversity to get soft contact. He’s not going to get a lot of swing and misses as his stuff lacks fire power, but he’s proven to be a weapon in this very good rotation due to his savvy veteran presence on the mound.

Next: Game 3: Bauer's resurgence as a starting pitcher