Blue Jays vs. Twins: Everything you need to know about the AL wild-card series

The Toronto Blue Jays return to the MLB post-season for a second consecutive year, and now they know who they’ll be up against.

The Minnesota Twins will host the Blue Jays for their best-of-three American League wild-card series beginning on Tuesday.

Here’s everything you need to know about how the teams stack up ahead of Game 1.

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STARTING PITCHING

Blue Jays: For a team that was supposed to be an offensive juggernaut, Toronto can thank their pitching for pulling them back into the post-season.

Kevin Gausman (12-9, 3.16 ERA) is expected to start in Game 1. The right-hander’s premier pitch is his splitter (a split-finger fastball). Thrown like a traditional fastball, a change in grip makes the ball sharply drop as it approaches home plate and leaves batters chasing a pitch that is out of the strike zone.

Jose Berrios (11-12, 3.65), Chris Bassitt (16-8, 3.60), or Yusei Kikuchi (11-6, 3.86) could also take the mound in the series.

Interesting stat: The Blue Jays were the only team to have four pitchers (Gausman, Bassitt, Kikuchi, Berrios) start at least 31 games this season. No other team had more than two pitchers hit that mark.

Twins: Minnesota boasts a pair of all-star pitchers in Pablo Lopez (11-8, 3.66) and Sonny Gray (8-8, 2.79) that have garnered some Cy Young buzz this year.

The projected Game 1 starter Lopez trails only Gausman in the AL for strikeouts, while projected Game 2 starter Gray sits behind only Yankees ace Gerritt Cole and Padres pitcher Blake Snell in ERA league-wide.

Joe Ryan (11-10, 4.51) will likely be the third man up, while Kenta Maeda (6-8, 4.23) and Bailey Ober (8-6, 3.52) round out the rotation for a unit that has combined to lead the MLB in strikeouts (1,545).

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RELIEF PITCHING

Blue Jays: Toronto was busy at the trade deadline, bringing in a pair of bullpen arms from the St. Louis Cardinals, with the key player being Jordan Hicks.

Hicks (3.29 ERA) has an average speed of just over 100mph on his fastball and has established himself as a set-up man (taking the ball in seventh or eighth inning) ahead of closer Jordan Romano (36 saves, 2.90 ERA).

Romano has had a rough go of things over his last few appearances for Toronto, giving up seven hits and four earned runs over 2.2 innings of work.

Twins: Closer Jhoan Duran (3-6, .245) leads an effective Minnesota bullpen. The 25-year-old was seventh in the AL this season with 27 saves.

The biggest wild-card for the Twins will be Brock Stewart (2-0, 0.65), who was exceptional in his role earlier in the season before being sidelined for nearly three months beginning in June with an elbow injury. The former Blue Jay has only appeared in three games since.

Griffin Jax (6-10, 3.86) figures to be the other pitcher most heavily involved.

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BATTING

Blue Jays: The team’s bats had gone cold in their series against the Yankees before exploding back to life against the Rays.

Bo Bichette (.306 batting average, 20 home runs), Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (.264 BA, 26 HR) and George Springer (.258 BA, 21 HR) are the cornerstones of the batting lineup.

Late-season call-up Davis Schneider (.276 BA, eight HR) provided a much-needed spark while Bichette was on the injured list, however the mustachioed slugger been in a bit of a slump lately, and has had a tough time getting the calls from umpires.

Twins: The approach of the Twins offence this season has very much been by-committee, with Minnesota sharing the AL-lead for home runs at 233 despite having no player crack the top 20. The unit as a whole ranks only 21st in batting average at .243, but makes up for it with its power, slotting in seventh across the MLB in both slugging percentage (.427) and in on-base-plus slugging (OPS) at .753.

Right-fielder Max Kepler leads the team with 24 home runs, 66 RBIs and is second in hits with 114, and will likely slot into the four-spot in the Twins batting order.

24-year-old Quebec City native Edouard Julien — who primarily operates as the Twins leadoff hitter — has been a sensation in his rookie season, leading the team in on-base percentage at .381, and is fourth in OPS at .840.

Carlos Correa — who has been sidelined with a foot injury for the last two weeks — is expected to be ready for the playoffs. Third-baseman Royce Lewis — who has played only 58 games this year but has been the Twins most efficient batter in limited action — is also a possibility to slot back into the lineup.

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DEFENCE

Blue Jays: The team ranks seventh in overall fielding percentage, and had the sixth-least amount of errors committed by their fielders.

They also boast three-time Gold Glove winner Kevin Kiermaier in centre field, who is notorious for robbing home runs from opposing players.

Twins: Fielding is an area that the Twins have outranked the majority of the MLB, sitting third in overall fielding percentage as well as committing the third-fewest errors in the league.

Correa (shortstop) and Kepler (right-fielder) both boast the third-best fielding rates at their positions.

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MANAGING

Blue Jays: John Schneider has a career regular-season record of 135-101 with Toronto, and is 0-2 in the post-season after last year’s sweep at the hands of the Seattle Mariners.

Schneider’s replay challenge success rate for the season sits at 34.6 per cent (18 out of 52 total challenges were successful).

Twins: Rocco Baldelli has a career regular season record of 375-333. Like his Toronto counterpart, Baldelli is winless in the post-season, having gone 0-5 over appearances in 2019 and 2020.

Baldelli, the 2019 AL manager of the year, has a higher success rate in replay challenges this year than his Toronto counterpart, with 47.1 per cent (16 out of 34 total challenges).