Houston vs. Toronto, 7:10 pm (CT)
TV: CSN Houston, MLB.TV
Radio: KBME 790 AM, KLAT 1010 AM
Blue Jays SBNation Blog: Bluebird Banter
Pitching Match
RHP Todd Redmond (1-1 / 3.32 ERA / 1.11 WHIP) vs. RHP Jordan Lyles (5-6 / 5.19 ERA / 1.51 WHIP)
Preview
The Blue Jays head south to the Astros in hopes of finishing strong in 2013. The Jays are currently 17.5 games out of first place and 11.5 games behind forth place. Injuries and starting pitching have been Toronto's downfall. The Blue Jays rank the third worst in the American League in wins (57), earned run average (4.39), and forth worst in WHIP (1.36). Only the Astros and Angels have been worse over all three categories.
On the mound today for the Blue Jays is Todd Redmond, this will be his eighth starts this season and second against the Astros. He had a quality start in his most recent outing, holding the Rays to one run over six innings. The lone run came off a Evan Longoria home run, happens to the best of pitchers. In the month of August, he has a 2.40 ERA over 15 innings.
In Redmon's previous start against Houston, on July 28, he pitched six innings of one-run ball. He walked two and struck out a season-high 10 batters. He only gave up three hits in the game, one was a solo home run by Brett Wallace. Marc Krauss and Jonathan Villar accounted for the other two hits.
Let's take a look at the Blue Jays over the last seven days at the plate. Brett Lawrie has been getting on base with .321 (9-28) average. Rajai has a stolen base on five of his last nine times on the base paths. Jose Reyes is battling a sore knee and hitting .353 (6-17). Anthony Gose has only four his last 23 at-bats. Jose Bautista is on the 15-day disabled list with a hip injury, joining both Melky Cabrera and Colby Rasmus.
On the mound today for the Astros is Jordan Lyles. Made one appearance out of the bullpen since last starting, he gave up two runs on 2.1 against the Angels. Over his last 39.1 innings before coming out of the pen, he has a 1-3 and a 7.09 ERA. This includes a 4 runs outing (5 IP, 9H, 2 HR, 3 BB, 1K) against the Blue Jays. Brett Lawrie and Jose Reyes each had solo home runs off the Astros' right-hander, the Jays also had five doubles in the game.
Two teams in the basement can't play spoiler against each other, thus these teams play to build momentum for next season.
