One Night Only: Game Previews for August 22nd
Tampa Bay’s Desmond Jennings will use his sunbeam superpower to unsettle Justin Verlander.
Featured Game
Detroit (2) at Tampa Bay (7) | 19:10 ET
• Justin Verlander, first among AL pitchers in SIERA (2.75) and WAR (6.2), pitches tonight for a Detroit team that improved its playoff odds either to 69.1% or 79.2% last night, depending on which methodology you prefer.
• Owing to how the center-field camera at Tropicana Field is one of the league’s better ones, tonight represents an opportunity to get all familiar-like with Verlander’s stuff.
• Apropos said stuff, here’s what Verlander throws according to Pitch F/x: fastball (45.6%), curveball (18.8%), changeup (18.2%), slider (8.6%), two-seamer (8.8%).
• Per pitch-type runs (which buckets four- and two-seam fastballs together), literally all those pitches are worth more than a run per 100 thrown.
• Literally literally. Not fake literally.
MLB.TV Audio Feed: Tampa Bay Television.
Also Playing
Here’s the complete schedule for all of today’s games, with our very proprietary watchability (NERD) scores for each one. Pitching probables and game times aggregated from MLB.com and RotoWire. The average NERD Game Score for today is 5.3.
The following Game Scores include the new and improved playoff-odds adjustment, which you can learn about in your brain by clicking here.
| Away | SP | Tm. | Gm. | Tm. | SP | Home | Time | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chris Narveson | MIL | 6 | 7 | 5 | 5 | 5 | PIT | Jeff Karstens | 17:05 |
| Zack Greinke | MIL | 10 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 6 | PIT | Brad Lincoln* | Gm 2 |
| Joe Saunders | AZ | 2 | 9 | 5 | 4 | 5 | WAS | Ross Detwiler | 19:05 |
| Dillon Gee | NYN | 3 | 5 | 5 | 3 | 10 | PHI | Cliff Lee | 19:05 |
| Jason Vargas | SEA | 3 | 0 | 5 | 6 | 5 | CLE | Fausto Carmona | 19:05 |
| Justin Verlander | DET | 10 | 2 | 8 | 7 | 6 | TB | Jeff Niemann | 19:10 |
| Jair Jurrjens | ATL | 5 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 7 | CHN | Ryan Dempster | 20:05 |
| Erik Bedard | BOS | 7 | 10 | 7 | 8 | 6 | TEX | C.J. Wilson | 20:05 |
| Zach Britton | BAL | 6 | 2 | 3 | 0 | 4 | MIN | Carl Pavano | 20:10 |
| Nathan Eovaldi* | LAN | 6 | 4 | 6 | 3 | 8 | STL | Chris Carpenter | 20:15 |
| Brett Myers | HOU | 5 | 3 | 4 | 6 | 5 | COL | Jhoulys Chacin | 20:40 |
NERD represents an attempt to anticipate the watchability of a game for the baseballing enthusiast.
To learn more about Pitcher NERD, click here and scroll down a little.
To learn more about latest Team NERD, click here.
To learn how Game NERD Scores are calculated, click here.
* = Fewer than 20 IP, NERD at discretion of very handsome author.
Carson Cistulli has published a book of aphorisms called Spirited Ejaculations of a New Enthusiast.
Lemme tell you, very handsome author, that I will absolutely be getting all familiar-like with Verlander’s stuff tonight.
Or, rather, I WOULD be, were I not already committed to working. His stuff is so gosh dang tantalizing, though. If only…
My real comment, however, is rather a question. Would you characterize Desmond Jennings, in owing to his sunbeam superpower, as a villain and the nemesis of a one Justin Verlander, or rather as a foil to his (i.e. Verlander’s) sheer magnificence?