View from the Catwalk: Yarby back

The Cleveland pitching gets tougher over the weekend, though

I’ll be the first to admit to being a rather large Ryan Yarbrough skeptic, but boy oh boy did he deliver in Cleveland on Thursday. In the opening game of a four-game set that is looking more and more important given the fact that both the Yankees and Red Sox have decided to never lose another game, Yarbs provided 7.1 shining innings in his return from Triple-A.

Yarbs was cooking down at Triple-A (2.14/2.23/2.79 ERA/FIP/xFIP) after having been sent down for decidedly not cooking at the MLB level earlier this season (8.10/4.65/4.46 before Thursday’s start). Zooming out, the FIP and xFIP really weren’t that far off of the 27-year-old lefty’s 2018 season, he was just having some tough luck. Thursday reversed that, and if Yarbrough can be back to his mid-4.00s self, that will be big for bridging the gap to whenever Glasnow gets back.

Thursday’s win was also important given that the Rays got to beat up on Adam Plutko (6.35/8.38/5.48) in game one of the series, but will now face Shane Bieber (3.22/3.72/3.44), Carlos Carrasco (4.30/3.62/3.27), and a TBD on Sunday. The Rays will counter with a couple of aces of their own in Blake Snell (3.31/2.58/2.37) and Charlie Morton (2.65/3.18/3.54), before turning to an opener for the series finale.

A split is the bare minimum, while taking three out of four would be a good result. A sweep and the vibes start to get good again.

Rays Links

• Stark: Is there hope for the Rays in Tampa Bay? — Lot of stadium talk out there yesterday...
• For heaven’s sake, can the grownups get involved in the Rays stadium search? — Like I said, lotta chatter...
• Marc Topkin’s takeaways from Rays’ 7-2 win Thursday against Cleveland
• Here all are 30 clubs’ reps for the 2019 draft — B.J. Upton and Lou Wieben for the Rays.
• One key number for each AL East team — Rays pitch good.
• Early impressions of four eye-catching 21-and-under arms — Emily Waldon on Matthew Liberatore.
• Why there is a lot of frustration for Rays’ Yandy Diaz and Cleveland’s Jake Bauers — Yandy wanted to smash.

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