New York Yankees vs. Toronto Blue Jays Predictions, Picks and MLB Preview – September 23, 2016

New York Yankees vs. Toronto Blue Jays Preview

Where: Rogers Centre, Toronto

When: Friday, September 23, 7:00 PM ET

Line: New York Yankees vs. Toronto Blue Jays – view all MLB lines

TV Broadcast: ESPN2

Writer’s Pick: Toronto

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Betting on the New York Yankees

Pitching for New York in the series opener is Bryan Mitchell (1-1, 6.00 ERA). He struggled mightily in his last start against the Boston Red Sox, allowing four runs on five hits (one homer) over 4.2 innings on Saturday. The Yankees lost that game, 6-5. The Bronx Bombers have now lost each of their last two games with Mitchell as their starter. Mitchell will take comfort in the fact, however, that he has had some success against the Blue Jays in the past. He hurled five shutout innings in his season debut against Toronto on September 7.

With Mitchell still a big question mark at this point, the onus is on the Yankee hitters to deliver some much-needed runs tonight. They looked sluggish in their 2-0 loss to Tampa Bay last night. Expected to lead the Bronx Bombers in this critical showdown is the red-hot Gary Sanchez. He is batting .375 (9-of-24) over his last seven games with five homers and 13 RBIs. Sanchez has inserted himself into the AL Rookie of the Year discussion, hitting a whopping 19 home runs in the first 46 games of his major league career.

Betting on the Toronto Blue Jays

The Toronto Blue Jays had their two-game winning streak snapped on Wednesday with a gut-wrenching 2-1 loss to the Seattle Mariners. It was a heart-breaking extra-innings defeat for the Blue Jays who failed to extend their wild card lead in the American League. They are currently a game ahead of the Detroit Tigers for first place in the AL Wild Card standings.

The Blue Jays will look to return to the win column when they face the Yankees in the opening game of their four-game set tonight. Starting for Toronto in this AL East matchup is left-hander Francisco Liriano (7-13, 5.08 ERA). He was picked over knuckleballer R.A. Dickey for this specific start. The veteran secured his spot in the rotation by surrendering just four earned runs over his previous 12.1 innings. He has pitched a whole lot better since the Blue Jays began deploying a six-man rotation.

Liriano can’t do it all alone, though, and he needs the Jays’ offense to pick up the scoring slack as well against the Yankees. They have scored just nine runs in their last three meetings with the Yankees. Toronto lost in all of those games. The onus then is on the sizzling Edwin Encarnacion to carry the cudgels for the Jays’ attack tonight. He is 8-of-27 over his last six games with three homers and seven RBIs. Encarnacion has also drawn a pair of walks during this stretch. He leads the Blue Jays in homers (42) and RBIs (123) this season.

Writer’s Prediction

Toronto wins, 5-2.

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