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Royals look to close out series on Wednesday
By: Zach Cohen - StatFox
Published: 10/21/2015  at  11:36:00 AM
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KANSAS CITY ROYALS (101-70)

at TORONTO BLUE JAYS (97-74)

First pitch: Wednesday, 4:05 p.m. ET
AL Championship Series – Game 5
Line: Kansas City +135, Toronto -145, Total: 9

The Royals will be looking to secure a spot in their second consecutive World Series with a Game 5 win over the Jays in Toronto Wednesday.

Kansas City jumped on R.A. Dickey early in Game 4 and ended up blowing out Toronto 14-2 to take a 3-1 lead in this series. The Royals have been determined all season long to prove that last year was no fluke and they’ll have a chance to do that Wednesday with RHP Edinson Volquez (14-10, 3.56 ERA, 165 K) taking on RHP Marco Estrada (13-9, 3.26 ERA, 130 K) of the Blue Jays. The Royals are an impressive 33-17 against the money line during the day this season and 10-3 against the money line during October as well. Toronto also has some trends in its favor, as the team is 21-6 against the money line when playing at home on Wednesday over the past two seasons and 49-25 against the money line as a favorite of -125 to -175 this season. The Blue Jays are also 4-2 against the Royals when playing at the Rogers Centre over the course of this season. Four of those six contests have gone Over the total. 2B Omar Infante (Oblique) is out indefinitely for this Kansas City team and RP Brett Cecil (Calf) is out for the season for Toronto.

The Royals will be looking to close this series out with a win on Wednesday and Edinson Volquez might just be the guy to help them do it. Volquez was superb in his start earlier in the series, allowing no earned runs in six innings of work. He has now given up three or less earned runs in three straight starts and even another quality start on Wednesday would put his team in good position to earn itself a spot in the World Series. Offensively, both 2B Ben Zobrist (.361, 1 HR, 5 RBI in playoffs) and OF Lorenzo Cain (.294, 1 HR, 7 RBI in playoffs) stepped it up in Game 4. Zobrist went 2-for-5 with a homer and two RBI in the victory and Cain was 2-for-3 with two walks and two RBI. Zobrist had been hitting well all postseason long, but the burst of power was excellent and if he can find a way to go yard again then it will be a big bonus to the team. For Cain, it was the superstar’s first multi-hit game of the postseason and he really needed that to get himself going. He should be able to do some damage at the plate in this elimination game as well.

The Blue Jays have their backs against the wall heading into Wednesday and Marco Estrada will be on the mound to save their season. Estrada was extremely reliable all season long for this team and has looked solid in these playoffs, allowing just four earned runs in a total of 11.2 innings on the mound. In two regular season starts against the Royals, Estrada also happened to allow just four runs in total. Offensively, the Blue Jays should have no trouble hitting the ball, but their bats have gone cold at times in this postseason. DH Edwin Encarnacion (.294, 1 HR, 4 RBI in playoffs), 3B Josh Donaldson (.273, 3 HR, 8 RBI in playoffs) and OF Jose Bautista (.235, 2 HR, 7 RBI in playoffs) combined to go just 2-for-11 with two RBI in Game 4. It’s clear that if this team is going to win then its big three will need to have a monster day, so the Blue Jays will be counting on them to keep their season alive on Wednesday.


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