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this write up helps LAKERBOY
Edwin Encarnacion’s finger injury is the big thing to watch. He aggravated it in Game One and still played in Game Two, so it’s unlikely he’ll be out of the lineup. It seems very possible, though, that he’ll play at a diminished level (maybe only slightly diminished, but diminished). In a perfect world, the Jays would probably slide him either up to the second slot, or down to the sixth or seventh, figuring he’s a bit less than his usual 40-homer self, and the cleanup spot is an awfully unfortunate place to pencil in a player whose power might be compromised. Among the thousand ways in which the world is imperfect, though, two are: 1. No manager thinks that way. If a guy is healthy enough to play, he nearly always bats in his customary spot. 2. Troy Tulowitzki is having a hard time at the plate right now, perhaps as he plays through the lingering effects of his cracked scapula, or perhaps for some other reason. In any event, it’d be hard to slide him up in the lineup and feel any better about things. On the Royals’ side, Salvador Perez’s wrist will be worth watching after he got hit with a follow-through in Game One. He, too, played in Game Two, so it’s probably a non-story. Perez is huge and tough and if Ned Yost’s refusal to ever, ever give him a day off isn’t going to take him down, then neither will a few foul tips hitting his mask at 100 mph, nor bats whacking him on the arm, nor pitches hitting him clean in the ribs when he’s at bat. Johnny Cueto hasn’t pitched an important game on the road since the NL Wild Card game back in 2013, in which the Pirates knocked him around and the fans (probably? maybe?) got deep inside his head. He’ll try to manage the moment better this time, in Toronto. The Blue Jays have to be relieved to have escaped the bat-flip buzzkill that is Kauffman Stadium, and come home to the fly-ball-friendly Rogers Centre. Cueto found some long-elusive success by going to his sinker a lot and his four-seamer not much at all in Game Five of the ALDS, and Edinson Volquez found success by attacking Blue Jays hitters with his sinker in Game One of this series, so look for Cueto and Perez to work the bottom of the zone a lot, especially away from all those right-handed Toronto sluggers. It’s something Cueto does well naturally, and it’s crucial to keeping the Jays from playing Plinko in the high-stacked decks of seats beyond the left-field wall. Marcus Stroman is only six starts into his season, which means he’s really just working past his personal spring training. There’s some evidence that he’s struggling to find feel and mimic his fastball arm action with his secondary stuff, especially his breaking balls. As a result, he’s been unusually sinker-heavy in his two playoff starts so far and he might not have the Royals as off balance here as he would under normal circumstances. That said, the Royals offer a starter a fairly comfortable first trip or two through the order. Stroman’s pattern in 2015 has been to get increasingly sinker-reliant as he turns the lineup over, but against the swing-happy Kansas City nine, he might try to get some quick outs early with that pitch, then confound their guesses later in the game by going in other directions. It’s just one of many possible counter-strategies to the Royals’ impressive rope-a-dope plan of attack on starters lately, but it might be more effective for Stroman, who has so many weapons in his arsenal than many other pitchers who have tried it. It would appear to us that manager John Gibbons is unsure about what to do next. When he removed David Price in Game 2, it was too late. Understandably, Price was dealing it but with men on first and third in that fateful seventh inning with the score 3-1 and two balls hit hard in a row, Gibbons looked beside himself in the dugout. Price was rattled and a good manager would have sensed it and made a move. It’s not like it was early in the game. Price did what he needed to do and gave Toronto six strong (near perfect) innings on the road but Gibbons hung him out to dry. An unsure manager makes all the wrong moves and there are plenty of things to think about for this one. Our original plan of attack was to play the Blue Jays in the series after being down 0-2 but a closer look suggests that’s not very smart. Toronto will have to win four of the next five games to win this series and they’re only a +220 dog. That’s not enough. The Royals gave up some valuable assets to get Johnny Cueto for this exact scenario. He’s an ace and now he’s being offered a rather ridiculous tag here. We keep looking at that big tag on Cueto and can't refuse it. Remember, this is a guy that was dominating for years at Great American Ballpark, a yard that increases LHB HRs by 52% and RHB HRs by 33%. Cueto thrived there and he could thrive here too. You would have to go way back in the archives to find the last time Cueto was offered a price like this, which includes many years in Cincinnati playing for a bunch of Reds’ teams that were a far worse team than the team he pitches for now. We suppose the market has a hard time envisioning the Blue Jays losing three in a row but we have no such seeing impairment. It’s actually tougher to win when you’re down 0-2 than it is to win being up 2-0. We also trust Ned Yost to make the right moves when necessary. This is the time of year when managerial decisions make a huge difference and Gibbons has not shown us that he has what it takes to make the right call. We get Cueto, Yost and plenty of momentum at a price tag that shouldn’t be offered.
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Originally Posted by Booya711
