The Baltimore Orioles and Toronto Blue Jays brought us one of the most memorable postseason games in the modern era last season. Baltimore and Toronto went into extra innings knotted at two and after some intense moments, gave us an ending for the ages. In the bottom of the 11th, Edwin Encarnacion crushed a home run to right field to end the game and send the Blue Jays to the ALDS. It was a crushing loss for a Baltimore team that thought it could make some serious noise in October.
This two-game series will be contested on Monday, April 3, 2017 and Wednesday, April 5, 2017 at Oriole Park in Baltimore.
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Pitching Matchups
Marco Estrada will be the Opening Day starter for the Blue Jays. Estrada has pretty decent peripherals and struck out a lot of batters last season, but his problem has been how often he gives up the gopher ball. On average, he gives up a home run a start and that’s cause for concern against the team that hit the most home runs in 2016.
Kevin Gausman will toe the rubber for the Orioles on Opening Day. Gausman shot through the minors and was seen as a top prospect in the farm system, but he hasn’t pitched more than 180 innings in a season through four years in the bigs and has yet to finish with a record over .500 either.
In the other matchup between these two teams, JA Happ will square off against Dylan Bundy. Happ had a breakout season at the age of 33, with a record of 20-4 but got incredibly fortunate according to advanced metrics. Happ had a FIP of 3.96 compared to an ERA of 3.18 and if he didn’t regress that would be a surprise.
Dylan Bundy made his long awaited major league debut last season and the flame-throwing right-hander flummoxed batters with his arsenal. Bundy averaged a bit less than a strikeout an inning, but allowed a decent amount of hard contact too. In 109.2 IP, he gave up 18 home runs, an average much higher than normal.
Weather Report
There’s a decent chance that Opening Day between these two teams is rained out. The game is slated to start a little bit after 3 p.m. ET, but there is rain expected to come in shortly after. The chance of rain rises from the first pitch onward and if the game gets stopped by rain, it likely won’t continue with the forecast calling for rain throughout the rest of the night.
If the rain happens to come in earlier than expected, it’s very likely this game doesn’t count. It would be pretty easy to move the game back to Tuesday though since both teams have that day off, but rain is once again in the forecast for Tuesday too.
Betting Trends
Under was a huge winner in games involving either Toronto or Baltimore last season. Under went 91-67-4 in Orioles’ games last season, a number that made bettors a ton of money. However, bettors would have made more money backing the under in every Blue Jays game. Toronto saw the under finish with a record of 93-63-6 in its games, a number that was best in the majors.
The Blue Jays were 10-9 against the Orioles last season with neither team ever recording a sweep over the other in six series. Building off of the under trend, the under was 12-7 in games between these two in 2016 and each of the last seven tilts went under as well.
With powerful hitters on both sides, it might still be a bit risky to back the under. Baltimore had more homers than anyone in baseball, while Toronto had the fourth-most and each team brings back almost everyone. Neither team hits for average well, but when they connect, it goes deep.
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