Down 2-0 in their best-of-seven American League Championship Series to the Cleveland Indians, the Toronto Blue Jays have their work cut out for them.
Thankfully, if U.S. media is to be believed, with their next two – and potentially three games – straight at Rogers Centre, the Blue Jays should hold an advantage thanks to their raucous Toronto fans, and potentially a called-strike disparity that will even up under the dome.
ESPN – Indians’ called strikes advantage significant through 2 games
Through two games, the Indians have had a major advantage over the Blue Jays when it comes to called strikes. By the calculations in a system devised by TruMedia (which factors in how often a pitch is called a strike based on pitch location and count), Indians pitchers have gotten 7.4 more called strikes than the average pitcher would have gotten on the same set of pitches.
By the same computations, Blue Jays pitchers have gotten 1.8 fewer strikes than the average pitcher.
In Game 1, Indians pitchers got 4.2 extra strikes to 0.9 for the Blue Jays. The Indians were the beneficiaries of four strike calls on pitches with a less-than-25 percent strike probability. The Blue Jays got one.
The gap in strikes above average in Game 2 was larger: 3.2 extra strikes for the Indians, 2.7 strikes below average for the Blue Jays, though neither team was the beneficiary of a strike call on a pitch with less than a 25 percent chance of being a strike.
ESPN – Toronto Loud: Is the atmosphere at the Rogers Centre the best in the game?
Baseball is booming in Toronto. It is hip to wear Jays gear. Toronto led the American League in home attendance, averaging nearly 42,000 per game. The atmosphere — “Toronto Loud,” as it’s now known — might be baseball’s best.
“It’s on fire right now,” Jays manager John Gibbons said.
When the roof is closed at what used to be called SkyDome and now is Rogers Centre, there might not be a more intimidating environment in the sport.
Kipnis said Rogers Centre “might be the toughest” road ballpark in the league.
“When they close that dome, it gets especially loud there,” he said. “And it’s hockey fans. I mean that in the best way, because I’m a hockey fan, too. That’s exactly what you want out of a fan. You want the rowdiness. You want that little feeling, that 1 percent feeling, where you’re like, ‘I’m not sure I’m safe right here on the field.’
“That’s what makes Toronto great and those fans amazing, how loud they get. They stand up for most of the entire game. They’re always into it. For opposing players, it makes it just as much fun.”
The Indians are hitting .182 (10-for-55) and the Blue Jays .159 (10-for-63). The one reason manager Terry Francona’s team is leading the series is because they’ve outpitched the Blue Jays.
“We’re up 2-0 and we’ve got five guys that haven’t checked in at the plate,” said second baseman Jason Kipnis. “It’s nice to somehow scrape away two wins here. It definitely eases the pressure of going to Toronto.”
