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We’ve got three games on our hands this Friday as we power through the Division Series in both leagues. Here’s how I see two of them shaking out.
Cleveland Guardians (+120) vs. New York Yankees (-140) Total: 6
One thing you must know heading into this game is that Shane Bieber is terrible against the New York Yankees. In three career regular-season starts against the AL East giants, he owns a 5.74 ERA. In his lone postseason start against them, he coughed up seven runs over 4 2/3 innings. That’s not very good.
Bieber also had a rather bad season by most predictive metrics. His expected ERA sat at 3.51 when the year came to a close, the result of a poor .245 expected batting average and a low 25%, which plummeted from 33.1% a season ago.
The Guardians righty should really struggle here against a Yankees offense which seems to be up and running once again, finishing the year with a 118 wRC+ in September and October. There’s also Nestor Cortes on the other side of things, who will be pitching to an offense ranked 27th in wRC+ to lefties. The All-Star struck out 14 Guardians in 12 innings this season, pitching to a 2.19 ERA against Cleveland.
This one should be one-sided.
Edge: Yankees -140
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Los Angeles Dodgers (-125) vs. San Diego Padres (+105) Total: 7.5
I’m not really sure what we’re doing with this line. The Dodgers won the regular season series between these two teams by a record of 14-5 and had no issues winning in San Diego. They’re the superior offense with a strong set of arms set to go on Friday, and I think they should win this one.
Tony Gonsolin will be capped at 75 pitches, but that could easily take him through six innings given how good he’s been and given the Padres’ awful 54 strikeouts through five games.
Gonsolin was exceptional this season with a 2.14 ERA and 3.12 xERA, keeping things under control with a 5.6% barrel rate. I find it hard to believe the Padres can lift the ball out of the park against Gonsolin, who has allowed one earned run in 12 2/3 innings pitched against San Diego this season. Behind him, Andrew Heaney and/or Dustin May will be a very solid option given what we’ve seen.
Blake Snell has had a tough time historically against L.A. and pitched to a very middling 3.86 ERA against his bitter rival this season. I wouldn’t expect the Padres to take a lead in the NLDS here.
Edge: Dodgers -125
