Rays vs. Blue Jays prediction: Guess on a Tampa Bay bounce-back

Simply when it seemed just like the Rays would possibly rewrite the document books after an ideal 13-0 begin, the Blue Jays ended their historic successful streak Friday to open a weekend sequence.

However I wouldn’t guess in opposition to Tampa Bay getting the final snort on Sunday with its ace on the mound.

For all the heroics we’ve seen from the Rays’ rotation this yr, Shane McClanahan remains to be the gem of this workers and one of the crucial feared pitchers in baseball.

And he has been just about untouchable by his first three begins of the season.

Getting into the weekend, the 25-year-old lefty owned MLB’s third-highest swinging strike price (17.8 %) and eighth-best CSW% (32.2 %), and his zone contact price (75.9 %) ranked second solely behind teammate Jeffrey Springs.

It’s no shock McClanahan has posted a 1.59 ERA forward of his scheduled begin Sunday — even higher than his mark final yr (2.54), when he completed sixth in Cy Younger voting.

Conversely, there’s respectable cause for concern for the third-place finisher from 2022, Toronto’s Alek Manoah, who was already a transparent regression candidate after he posted an xERA (3.31) that was nicely above his precise ERA (2.24) final yr.

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Positive sufficient, Manoah’s present xERA (8.01) is much worse than his already gaudy ERA (4.91), and he’s considered one of simply two certified starters with a strikeout price (15.9 %) at or beneath his stroll price (15.9 %). Due to how potent this Rays lineup has been all season, I’m all-in on Tampa Bay scoring the outright upset in a minor vengeance spot.

The play: Rays, -110.