Wednesday 10/8 Division Series Thoughts & Analysis

Mariners @ Tigers

We begin with he only other spot on the board without clarity and we won’t be getting there before this post is finished because MLB did a poor job of dealing with weather difficulties and we’re now watching both ALDS game threes simultaneously.

Bryce Miller is the suspected pitcher, which I’m sure the Mariners would feel much better about if they won game three, though they’d still have to win game four either to avoid the prospect of facing Tarik Skubal for a second time in this series.

The other options would be Emmerson Hancock or George Kirby on three days rest.

Over 12 starts since the beginning of May, interrupted for over two months mid-June, Bryce Miller struck out only 43 of the 263 batters he faced and 11 of those came in one start against the Angels, who were averaging 30% strikeout rates throughout their lineup at that point in the season. The 10.2 K-BB% was easily a career worst for a guy who posted 17.3% and 17.9% marks over his first two seasons. Also a career worst, his 48.6 HardHit%, resulting in an unpleasant 5.29 xERA. Miller’s pitch modeling (4.36 Bot ERA, 98 Pitching+) were his only estimators below four and a half. Still, pitch model grading on every single one of his pitches declined this year.

On the road, Miller’s K-BB dropped to 8% and is 7.4 points below his rate at home for his career (12.5%). LHBs were above a .335 wOBA and xwOBA against Miller this year with RHBs within three points of .370. For his career, Miller allows a 41 point higher wOBA on the road with LHBs (.353) 34 points better than at home. I don’t expect the Mariners to be confident sending him out there in a must win game.

Casey Mize struck out just one of the 12 Guardians he faced after striking out exactly eight in three of his last four regular season starts. His small reverse split (LHBs .313 wOBA, .294 xwOBA: RHBs .327, .323) suggested it was a decent matchup.

Mize, increased his slider usage (23.3% vs 15.3% season) and decreased curveball usage (6.3% vs 14.3%) over the final month of the season. This was not a circumstance of facing more RHBs either (Yankees, Guardians, Braves and Red Sox). Mize flashed a 14.2 SwStr% over this stretch with slight improvement in his pitch modeling from around average to a bit above average. The ironic thing is that his curveball showed the most improvement via grading. In his Wild Card start, 15 of 62 pitches were sliders and just two were curves/slurves. The only other interesting numbers in the data for that start are 16 foul balls on 32 swings.

Gone are the ground balls (49% last year vs 38.7% in 2025), but in their place, Mize’s K-BB rises from 10.8% in 2024 to a career best 16.4% this season. This allowed him to drop his xERA by over a run (4.72 to 3.70), despite a higher rate of barrels this year (9.1%). His 3.87 ERA was within one-fifth of a run of all estimators with only his Bot ERA (4.04) sneaking above four.

Temperatures may not even reach 60 degrees in Detroit on Wednesday afternoon, which turns Comerica from a neutral run environment to a negative one (assuming no significant wind impact), but at least we probably won’t have to worry about rain. Behind the plate Chris Guccione is as neutral as they get.

I have Mize more than three-quarters of a run better than this version of Miller (who may have been pitching with a bad back all season) and also give the home team substantial base running and defensive edges. However, the Mariners have a decent offensive edge and maybe even a larger bullpen one, assuming all are available. The Mariners may pull out all stops for Game Three with starting deficiencies in Games Four and Five. 

I make the home team moderate F5 favorites (-130 to -135 range) and smaller full game favorites (-110ish) with a full game total of eight (4.75 F5). Because of the lengthy rain delay, we won’t have any of that information until late on Tuesday night or any DFS pricing until both games are completed.

Brewers @ Cubs

After laying out Options A (Priester) and B (Quintana) for Milwaukee on Monday, they went with option C (Misiorowski) behind Ashby, who allowed Chicago’s only three runs as the opener. It turned out to be a wise choice (the follower, not the opener) by Pat Murphy, but also allows me to simply copy and paste the Priester portion from Monday’s article:

Preister’s peripherals have been a bit streaky (19.7 K-BB% L5 starts, 12.3% prior nine outings, 25.6 K-BB% in four starts before that), but his 56.1 GB% has been steady. He was barreled up just 34 times (7.4%) with a 39.4 HardHit%. Posting a 12.6 K-BB% overall, Priester wouldn’t have an estimator above four if not for 18 of his barrels leaving the park (4.01 FIP) and the worst pitch modeling on the board (among confirmed starters for Wednesday).

By wOBA, Priester had a 27 point standard split. By xwOBA, 43 points. The Cubs usually send four extremely competent LHBs to the plate against RHP, averaging a 115 wRC+ and .190 ISO.

Jameson Taillon allowed just two runs over his final 19 innings (three quality starts), including a season high eight strikeouts in his final effort of the season. Taillon will throw six pitches, but only his fastball (38.5%) more than 15.1% of the time. It doesn’t lead to a lot of missed bats (18.9 K%), but he commands his arsenal well (5.2 BB%, 65 BotCmd, 109 Location+) and has managed contact fairly well this season (8.1% Barrels/BBE, 38.3 HardHit%). The result of all of the above is a 3.63 Bot ERA and 3.88 xERA that run near his actual results (3.68 ERA) with more traditional estimators (4.34 xFIP – 4.77 dERA) running quite a bit higher.

The will face their first RHP of the series, having mashed a pair of Cubs’ lefties to start the series. The projected lineup averages just a 100 wRC+ and .150 ISO vs RHP this season, but that’s mostly due to Perkins and Ortiz at the bottom. While Taillon has a 60 point reverse split, Statcast narrows that down to a single point with batters from either side essentially owning a league average xwOBA against him this year.

This is not Taillon’s first elimination game of this post-season. He successfully navigated through four shutout innings, striking out four of 14 Padres to clinch the Wild Card series for the Cubs. He did not walk a batter and only allowed two hits. Taillon’s velocity was up 0.2 mph and his iVB up an to 18 from his season average in that start, perhaps knowing he wasn’t going to be long for the game. Taillon generated 11 whiffs on 60 pitches, his second highest swinging strike rate of the season at 18.3%. He generated at least a 33 CSW% (called plus swinging strike rate) on every pitch except the sinker he threw twice. This will be a similar situation for Taillon at Wrigley. Win or go home.

Already a negative run environment, Wrigley may not see 60 degrees during this game either. I don’t have potential wind effects for you, but the current total makes me think they might be blowing in. Will Little is another neutral umpire calling balls and strikes.

I have Priester a bit more than one-third of a run ahead of Taillon, who I grade as a league average starting pitcher. While the Brewers’ 110 wRC+ on the road matches the Cubs’ 109 at home, Chicago has a three point advantage against RHP. By projected lineups, the Cubs average 15 points of wRC+ better and 40 points of ISO against RHP. Both of these lineups project great defensively and base running wise. With Misiorowski Ashby the only Brewer relievers likely unavailable, bullpens are close too.

It's very close all around, but I project the home team around -110 F5 and close to -120 full game, which finds no edges edges over the market. If we get hitter friendly or neutral wind information, I may have a lean on the total, which is currently 6.5.

Phillies @ Dodgers

If I were to defend Philadelphia’s decision to start Aaron Nola over Ranger Suarez in Game Three in an elimination spot, I, first, wouldn’t do a good job of it and second, point to his board best Bot ERA (3.34). Nola did finish the season with eight two hits innings, striking out nine of 26 Twins, but still finished the season with a 6.01 ERA. With a 17.1 K-BB%, 62.4 LOB% and 18.2 HR/FB (all his worst in any non-pandemic season since 2016), non-pitch modeling estimators from a 3.72 xFIP to a 4.58 FIP are nowhere close to that. If you want to further argue 18 of his 25 barrels leaving the park, I would point out that he does pitch in Philadelphia, but also grant you an extra third of a run of relief with his 4.24 xERA.

Nola’s velocity was up in his last two starts (92.7 mph vs 91.9 mph on the season) with all four pitches with at least a 55 PB grade and 111 Pitching+, so maybe we are getting the better, healthier version, but LHBs within a point of a .370 wOBA and xwOBA against him this year still scares the hell out of me against this lineup. Speaking of which, the Dodgers haven’t used their RHP lineup in October yet, having faced three straight LHPs. That game one Wild Card lineup against Hunter Greene averaged a 117 wRC+ and .205 ISO vs RHP this year and that’s even with Rortvedt’s 22 wRC+.

Most of this is just trivial, but still some amazing patterns. Yoshinobu Yamamoto (I type out the full name for the post-season) allowed a single run or less in each of his last five starts. He allowed a single run in each of the first three, but finished with two shutout outings. After a four game stretch where he struck out six batters each time out, he struck out exactly 10 in each of his next three before seven in each of his last two. He had a three game stretch allowing four hits each, followed by one hit allowed in three straight games before finishing the season in a start with…four hits. Perhaps most importantly, he finished the season two outs shy of seven straight quality starts (because he walked six Giants) and completed at least seven innings in four of those starts.

Increasing his workload and becoming the work horse for this team, while retaining a 20.8 K-BB% this season is sure to get Yamamoto some Cy Young attention, likely a top five vote getter. Add in the contact profile (52.8 GB%, 5.7% Barrels/BBE) and his 2.73 xERA is only a quarter run removed from a 2.49 ERA, though the .243 BABIP is probably not sustainable and more than 40 points below what the Dodger defense allowed. Yamamoto will likely be facing a slightly different lineup than Snell, but has held batters from either side of the plate to no higher than a .290 wOBA or xwOBA with a 40 to 50 point reverse split.

Yamamoto dominated the deciding game against the Reds, striking out nine of 28 batters with two unearned runs early. His fastball was up 0.7 mph (96.1) with more spin, but the same 16 inch iVB. He got seven swings and misses on 32 curveballs and a total of 10 on his other 81 pitches. The curveball and fastball each accounted for 15 called and swinging strikes over a combined 76 pitches for an amazing 39.5 CSW%.

Weather is pretty stable in Los Angeles. Expect Dodger Stadium to play at it’s normal 102 Park Run Factor (Statcast 3-year), making it easily the most positive run environment on the board, considering cooler weather in other spots. In addition, Nic Lentz is a top five hitter friendly umpire.

The Dodgers have a 28 point Home/Road wRC+ edge and are slightly better than the Phillies against RHP by both team statistics for the season and projected lineup averages. I give Nola credit for being  much better than his ERA and even slightly above average, but still have him nearly a full run behind Yamamoto. The only Philly edge here is a small base running one and the potential for Dave Roberts to run out the wreckage in his bullpen in a high leverage spot again.

I have the Dodger a bit better than -150 for the F5 innings and a bit below -150 full game, which aligns with the market. Considering the conditions (park, weather, umpire) I do have some interest in the total and think I’m going to attack that with the Dodgers only.

LAD o4.5 (+106) FD 0.5u

I’ll return with more content the next time we have more than one game. In the meantime, I’ll post any other games of interest on Action Network (follow Rocky Jade).

Below, these last two graphics are pitch matchup ratings, explained here. It uses pitch frequencies and run values both for the pitcher and the opposing offense and then attempts to add in pitch modeling, which sometimes differs from actual results.