I have to give the Toronto Blue Jays a lot of credit. We all knew that the offense was going to be good, but what they’ve done with Robbie Ray is really impressive. This is a team that seems to be right on the cusp of going on a big run to put some pressure on the Red Sox and Rays as the All-Star Break and the Trade Deadline near.
What people aren’t really talking enough about is what they’ve done with Ross Stripling. Ray’s re-emergence as a dominant starter has caught a lot of eyes and gotten a lot of press, but Stripling’s similarly impressive turnaround has not. He gets the call today against the Rays and I think this is a really interesting handicap in multiple ways.
Stripling gave up six runs on eight hits to Boston back on May 19. His next appearance featured seven innings of shutout relief against Tampa Bay. Since getting his brains beaten in by the BoSox, Stripling has a 2.45 ERA over his last 40.1 innings of work. The weird thing is that he hasn’t learned or polished some new pitch. He hasn’t changed up his pitch usage a ton, except for one area. He’s thrown more fastballs.
It’s the same thing that the Blue Jays did with Ray. It’s almost like they’ve simplified everything in such a way that a pitcher can simply go out there and try to locate the most important pitch in his arsenal and then attack hitters more aggressively with that. Stripling has 39 strikeouts against 10 walks in that span.
While Stripling has gotten better, Shane McClanahan has gone in reverse. The Rays starter had an ERA over 5 in the month of June. He did run into some bad luck with a high BABIP and a high HR/FB% despite some okay exit velocity metrics. As more teams get a look at him, I think this will be more of the norm.
Ultimately, for me, I see a league right now that is tilted towards offense. The teams that are having the most success at present are the teams that can score runs and score them in bunches. Over the last 30 days, which basically encompasses the time from MLB’s first memo to now, the Blue Jays rank third in wOBA. The Rays rank 23rd.
I know, context is important, especially with Tropicana Field. The Rays have a 99 wRC+ in that span. The Blue Jays have a 119. So, park-adjusted, the Blue Jays just stand out so much more than the Rays in these recent splits and it really does feel like Toronto is figuring things out on the fly and putting together some really good pitcher plans and performances to go with what we know is an elite-level offense.
I’ll be on Toronto with the short price here. I think Stripling has done more than enough lately to warrant some respect and the Toronto offense keeps chugging right along.
Pick: Toronto Blue Jays
Other games: Chicago Cubs at Cincinnati Reds; Houston Astros vs. Cleveland Indians