☆ 2016 ALCS ☆ Toronto Blue Jays vs CLEVELAND INDIANS ☆
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Asshole tbs annnouncers blame Toronto's lack of offensive production on the break between series instead of Cleveland pitching.
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Asshole tbs annnouncers blame Toronto's lack of offensive production on the break between series instead of Cleveland pitching.
Asshole tbs annnouncers blame Toronto's lack of offensive production on the break between series instead of Cleveland pitching.
Maybe they have to tear up their script AGAIN and start to say "Indians win".
But they were raving over Miller time, even Pedro.
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The Blue Jays are, after all, in a 2-0 hole in the best-of-seven American League Championship Series against the Indians, which means proper perspective is in order going into Game 3 at Rogers Centre (8 p.m. ET Monday on TBS, as well as Sportsnet and RDS in Canada). And as we dig deep into our encyclopedic knowledge of postseason's past, we go way, way back to find a plucky team that was actually in a 2-0 hole in a best-of-five and rallied to win the series:
The 2015 Toronto Blue Jays!
"We were here last year," said noted historian Troy Tulowitzki, who remembers last year's AL Division Series uprising against the Rangers. "There's no quit in us. ... We'll definitely make it interesting. I promise you that."
Plenty of factors align to make that promise sound anything but empty.
The Indians once again maximized the value of their home-field edge at the start of a series, and they stared down the Red Sox in Fenway Park in Game 3 of the ALDS. But the much-larger sample that is the regular season suggests they were simply not the same team on the road (notably, 1.5 fewer runs per game).
More meaningfully, in the context of this particular series, the Indians' formula of riding Andrew Miller for all he's worth will be complicated by the concept of three games in three days. Cleveland will also send Trevor Bauer out to the mound to oppose Marcus Stroman just days after his hobby of routine drone maintenance caused him to slice his right pinkie finger, necessitating 10 stitches and pushing him back from a Game 2 assignment. The Tribe is expectant that Bauer's finger will be a non-issue in this start, but there's no telling if the cut will open or otherwise harm his feel for his pitches and if the bullpen will be put to work early.
"[Friday night] they were going to put a couple more stitches in just to ensure the healing, and they decided not to," Indians manager Terry Francona said. "They thought even in a day's time, it was already progressing very well. I think he's going to be just fine."
It's still not out of the question that the Tribe could bring back Corey Kluber on short rest in Game 4 on Tuesday, especially if Bauer can't give them length in this one.
"There's a little bit of ambiguity there," Francona said. "Trevor with his finger, with [penciled-in Game 4 starter Mike] Clevinger not being stretched out ... I think we'll go game by game. And all of our pitchers are unbelievably cooperative, which is not shocking."
What's shocking, to some, is how punchless Toronto's bats were in Games 1 and 2.
Kluber danced around traffic in Game 1, and Josh Tomlin and his curveball tied them up in knots in Game 2. In both games, Miller zipped through the lineup with five strikeouts and Cody Allen nailed down the save. The Blue Jays, as a team, have compiled a .159 batting average with 25 strikeouts in 63 at-bats.
"History shows that we can hit the baseball," Russell Martin said. "It definitely would be nice to start doing that."
The Indians really aren't hitting, either. They're hitting .182 as a ballclub, but Francisco Lindor has come through with three huge RBIs -- a two-run homer that served as Game 1's only production and the go-ahead RBI single in Game 2. The Tribe will have a tough assignment against Stroman, who in two regular-season starts against Cleveland allowed just two runs with 15 strikeouts in 14 innings. But the Indians also believe they are due to break out, too.
"We've got five or six guys in the lineup who haven't even checked in yet," Jason Kipnis said. "The fact that we scraped out two wins, holding home field, with only a few guys swinging the bat well, is very encouraging."
》History is encouraging for the Indians, too. In the time that the LCS has been a best-of-seven, 24 of the 27 teams that have taken a 2-0 lead have advanced to the World Series.《
Even if you adjust those numbers to metric units with the move to Canada, it's a high percentage.
That said, the Blue Jays didn't get this far without a high amount of faith in their abilities, and they'll have a raucous Canadian crowd behind them in Game 3, as well as the knowledge that they've come back from worse.
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10/17 8:05 PM - Game 3 Money Line (vegasinsider.com)
951 Cleveland open +175 now concensus +170
952 Toronto open -200 now concensus -200 Toronto a big home favorite!
Total runs - 9 OVER/UNDER
Pitchers: (CLE) Trevor Bauer
(TOR) Marcus Stroman NOTES:
Open Line: Consists of the first betting line received from one of our Las Vegas or Online sportsbooks.
VI Consensus: Consists of the current betting line which occurs most frequently among our list of Las Vegas and Online sportsbooks.
All Game Times are Eastern Standard Time.
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Somehow I think that money line is a bit high for Toronto being that they've been stunned by this hot Indians team, Toronto can't be considered hot......but we'll see.
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....."And as we dig deep into our encyclopedic knowledge of postseason's past, we go way, way back to find a plucky team that was actually in a 2-0 hole in a best-of-five and rallied to win the series:".....Why does that article say a best of five?
It must refer back to when Toronto was in an 0-2 situation in a 5 game series and won.
Not the best analogy really except if Toronto sweeps at home they will be +1 going back to Cleveland and their home field advantage.
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This is the most important thing to remember going forward. .......
》History is encouraging for the Indians, too. In the time that the LCS has been a best-of-seven, 24 of the 27 teams that have taken a 2-0 lead have advanced to the World Series.《
Now they just have to close out the deal.
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