Wednesday, April 18, 2007

MLB 07 - Game 13

Wednesday, April 18 Rogers Centre 7:07 PM ET

Tim Wakefield, RHP (1-1, 1.38) Red Sox (7-5) @ Tomo Ohka, RHP (0-1, 7.84) Blue Jays (8-5)

Boston 1/2 game behind Toronto, 1 game ahead of Baltimore, and NYY. Second game of 3 game series. Toronto leads series 1 - 0.

ESPN.Com preview should be here.
Yahoo's preview should be here.
The recap after the game will be here.

From MLB.Com Scouting Report:

Red Sox: Wakefield's signature knuckleball had extra bite on a brisk Friday at Fenway, where the 40-year-old starter shut down Vladimir Guerrero and the Angels' bats. Wakefield gave up just five hits and one run in seven innings, lowering his season ERA to a sparkling 1.38. Wakefield yielded just one earned run in his first start of the year against Texas. Wakefield has thrown more Major League innings (217 2/3) against the Blue Jays than any other team. He has a 3.93 ERA against the Jays, but that number rises to 4.75 at Toronto's Rogers Centre.

Blue Jays: Ohka has gotten off to a rough start this season. In his previous outing, the 31-year-old took the loss after allowing four earned runs on eight hits over six innings against the Tigers. That start followed a disappointing performance in Tampa, in which he allowed five runs on six hits over 4 1/3 innings. This will be Ohka's first appearance vs. Boston in his career.

As usual all statistics were found at the day by day database at Baseball Musings and this year at Baseball Reference.

Expected Batters vs opposing starter

PlayerABHits2b3bHR'sRBIBB'sK'sBA
J. Lugo82100000.250
K. Youkilis------------------------------------
D. Ortiz31000000.333
M. Ramirez183101414.167
J.D. Drew81000003.125
M. Lowell3510102514.286
D. Mirabelli------------------------------------
C. Crisp------------------------------------
D. Pedroia------------------------------------
Totals 72173039211.236

Cora has faced Ohka 9 times with 1 hit, Hinske 12 times with 2 hits, Varitek has never faced Ohka and Wily Mo has faced him 12 times with 3 hits. The bench players actually lower the BA for the team against Ohka to a .219. Pena might be the only one to play but I would not count on it since that would be 3 games in a row (unless they decide to give Manny the night off) which migh not be a bad idea since he is batting a whopping .167 and has started all of the games so far this year.

Historical Pitching lines

PitcherGSWLShoIPHERHRBBKERA
Ohka0000000000----
Wakefield301280217 2/32179519771723.93

Wakefield has appeared in 40 games vs the Jays with 10 being in relief. Below is his records as a starter and reliever.

RoleGamesWLShoIPHERHRBBKERA
Starter301180195 2/31938215671573.77
Relief10100222413410155.32

In his 30 starts he has 17 quality starts, has went 6+ innings 23 times and gave up 3 or less runs 21 times. Overall, Tim has done a pretty good job against the Jays as a starter.

This is a team that Tim does good against but as usual, the batters in a Wakefield game are facing an unknown pitcher. Don't be surprised if the offense struggles again letting Timmy down. In his last 5 starts against the Jays, Wakefield is 5 and 1 with a 3.18 ERA. His last start was the only loss when the Sox were blanked by Shaun Marcum 5 - 0.

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