The Cleveland Indians have been the best Under team in the MLB this season, but the recent developments with Zac Plesac and Mike Clevinger mean different starters will be relied upon to keep this going.
Righty Triston McKenzie, who has never pitched above Double-A and missed all of 2019 due to injury, will make his MLB debut for the Indians. On Saturday he faces Matthew Boyd, who in his last 23 starts has a 6.53 ERA and is giving up 2.6 home runs and 3.2 walks per nine innings, while going five innings or fewer in each of his past eight starts.
The Tigers came into this weekend series losers of 20 straight games against the Indians, being outscored by 81 runs in that span.
While the Indians entered the series with the league’s worst batting average (201), they averaged seven runs per game versus the Tigers in the Aug. 14-16 series, and gave up five runs in two of those games, as well. With the Tigers having given up at least five runs in eight of their last nine games entering Friday, all losses, it should lead to the Indians’ trend of Unders being halted.
The play: Tigers-Indians total, Over 10 runs.