Eight Games, A Wounded Dodgers Staff And An 11.5 At Coors

Philadelphia arrives off consecutive shutouts, 5-0 and 8-0 at Camden Yards, which is a strange way for a 59-53 team with a minus-4 run differential to enter a Monday. The Phillies sit eight games behind Atlanta in the National League East and their staff has struck out 1,091 hitters, more than any other in baseball, yet the ERA reads 4.22 and 135 balls have left the yard against them. Kyle Schwarber has 33 home runs and Bryce Harper is at .255/.360/.497.

Aaron Nola gets the ball at 3-9 with a 5.61 ERA, and the home run column is the whole story: 26 in 114 innings, a rate of 2.05 per nine that no other starter on Monday's board approaches. His pitch mix has inverted from the version most fans remember. Nola now throws his knuckle curve more than anything else, 33.7 percent of the time at 78.2 mph, ahead of a four-seam fastball he uses only 23.4 percent of the time at 92.2 mph. Recent form has been split: five and two-thirds innings of one-run ball against Miami on July 28, but five and a third innings and five earned runs with two homers against the Dodgers on July 22.

Washington has not announced a starter, and the Nationals walk in at 55-58 having lost five straight and seven of ten. What makes them dangerous anyway is raw power. Washington has hit 164 home runs, the most in the majors, led by James Wood at .266/.394/.538 with 30 and CJ Abrams at .287/.363/.554 with 28 and 85 RBI. The oddity in their profile is location: the Nationals are 32-24 away from home and 23-34 at it, so the road half of the split is the good one. The market has Philadelphia at -156 with a 9.5 total, over at even money and under at -120.

Cam Schlittler has turned into the best starting pitcher on this eight-game card and it is not particularly close. The right-hander is 10-6 with a 2.04 ERA, a 0.91 WHIP and a .196 opponent average, with 165 strikeouts against 26 walks in 136.2 innings. On July 24 he threw 7.1 innings against Philadelphia, allowed three hits, walked nobody and struck out twelve on 99 pitches. He works off a 97.9 mph four-seam fastball 44.5 percent of the time and a 94.6 mph cutter 26.5 percent of the time, so hitters get two pitches in the mid-to-upper 90s that move in opposite directions.

St. Louis counters with Michael McGreevy, whose 3.57 ERA over 116 innings is genuinely respectable and whose 5.90 strikeouts per nine is the lowest figure among Monday's announced starters. He is a contact manager who needs defense, which made his last outing ugly: 1.2 innings, eight hits and seven earned runs against the Cubs on July 28. Before that he had allowed four earned runs or fewer in each of his previous four starts. The Cardinals are 55-57 and just took two of three in Toronto, closing with a 5-1 win on Sunday, but they hit .239 as a club with a .689 OPS.

New York is 63-49 and 2.5 games behind Tampa Bay in the AL East, and the Yankees have done it without most of their lineup's marquee names. Aaron Judge is on the 60-day injured list, Giancarlo Stanton and Cody Bellinger are on the 10-day list, and Carlos Rodón (15-day) and Clarke Schmidt (60-day) are out of the rotation. Ben Rice has carried the offense at .266/.354/.561 with 31 home runs. The pitching has done the rest: a 3.28 ERA is the best mark in baseball. New York is priced at -205 with the run line coming back at +103 and a total of 8.

Milwaukee owns the best record in baseball at 69-42 and the second-best team ERA at 3.48, and the Brewers are 36-20 inside American Family Field. They arrive off a 3-0 loss in Anaheim, which barely dents a season built on run prevention: 420 runs allowed, fewest in the majors, with a 1.16 WHIP and a .220 opponent average. Jake Bauers has been the offensive engine at .270/.373/.504 with 20 home runs, and Brice Turang has 69 RBI to go with 15 steals.

Bubba Chandler throws the hardest fastball anyone will see Monday. His four-seamer averages 98.5 mph and he uses it 47.5 percent of the time, backed by a 90.4 mph slider at 19.9 percent and a 91.7 mph changeup. The command has been the issue: 57 walks in 104.2 innings works out to 4.90 per nine, and the season line reads 3-8 with a 4.56 ERA. When it clicks, it looks like July 22 against the Yankees, when he gave up two hits and no runs in 6.1 innings on 84 pitches. When it does not, it looks like his four-inning, four-walk outing in Washington on July 5.

Brandon Sproat takes the ball for Milwaukee at 3-6 with a 5.05 ERA, and the shape of his trouble mirrors Chandler's: 46 walks in 92.2 innings plus 17 home runs allowed, a 1.65 rate per nine. He rebounded with six innings and three earned runs against San Francisco on July 27. Pittsburgh, at 56-57 after a 10-2 loss in Cincinnati, brings the most strikeout-prone lineup in baseball with 1,063 punchouts, offset by 100 stolen bases and Bryan Reynolds at .269/.382/.450. Oneil Cruz is on the 60-day injured list and Ryan O'Hearn is on the 10-day list.

A 47-65 team is not supposed to be a coin flip on national television, yet here it is. The market lists San Francisco at -110 and Texas at -109, which is as close to a pure pick'em as a book will post, with the total at 8. San Francisco has the worst road profile of any team on this board at 21-38 and just got swept in San Diego by 7-0, 6-5 and 5-4 scores. Rafael Devers has 23 home runs, Luis Arraez is hitting .324, and the roster is thin: Matt Chapman, Harrison Bader and Casey Schmitt are all on the 10-day injured list.

Logan Webb is the reason the number sits where it does. The right-hander is 6-7 with a 3.93 ERA and a 1.12 WHIP, having walked only 30 hitters in 119 innings. He is also one of the least fastball-dependent starters in the game: a sinker 30.6 percent of the time at 92.1 mph, a changeup 25.4 percent at 86.0, a sweeper 18.8 percent at 84.2, and a four-seamer only 12.6 percent of the time. He held Milwaukee to two earned runs over six innings on July 29. He also gave up eleven hits and seven earned runs in three innings at Colorado on July 3, so the floor exists.

Texas has not announced a starter and enters on a five-game losing streak, capped by a home sweep at the hands of Houston that dropped the Rangers 2.5 games behind in the AL West at 55-57. The injury list is why. Jack Leiter, Jakob Junis and Chris Martin are on the 15-day list, Jordan Montgomery, Cody Bradford, Robert Garcia and Danny Jansen are on the 60-day, and Josh Jung, Kyle Higashioka and Cody Freeman are on the 10-day. Joc Pederson has been the one steady bat at .253/.341/.509 with 20 home runs.

Houston is the hottest team in baseball right now, winners of six straight and 9-1 in its last ten, having just swept Texas by 11-2, 5-4 and 7-3. That run put the Astros back in first place in the AL West at 58-55, which is remarkable given a 4.65 team ERA and a major-league-worst 480 walks issued. Yordan Alvarez is the reason the arithmetic works: .330/.442/.650 with 35 home runs and 84 RBI, backed by Jeremy Peña at .322 and Christian Walker's 22 homers. Carlos Correa remains on the 60-day injured list.

Cristian Javier starts for Houston in what has been a stop-and-start season, four starts and 21.1 innings with a 7.17 ERA and 15 walks. His last outing was easily the best: five scoreless innings against the Angels on July 27 with seven strikeouts, no walks and 70 pitches, the first time all year he had worked past the third. Javier throws a four-seam fastball 51.6 percent of the time at 93.0 mph and a sweeper 23.0 percent at 80.0 mph, a thirteen-mph separation that lives or dies on fastball location.

Shane Bieber has been even more volatile for Toronto. Seven starts, 31.1 innings, a 5.74 ERA and 18 walks, and the last two outings could not have looked less alike: seven innings and one earned run with zero walks against Tampa Bay on July 23, then two outs, six walks and four earned runs on 42 pitches against Washington on July 28. Toronto is 52-60 and last in the AL East with a .682 team OPS, missing Anthony Santander and Addison Barger from the lineup and José Berríos, Bowden Francis and Yimi García from the pitching staff. Kazuma Okamoto's 24 home runs lead the club.

Three runs. That is the gap between this total and every other game on Monday's board, and Coors Field earns it. Colorado's staff carries the worst ERA in the majors at 5.46, the worst WHIP at 1.51 and the worst opponent batting average at .289, and it has allowed 636 runs, more than any other team. What complicates the read is that the Rockies are actually playing well: three straight wins, including 12-6 and 8-1 results against Kansas City over the weekend, with Hunter Goodman at 33 home runs and Mickey Moniak slugging .547.

Michael Lorenzen starts for Colorado at 3-9 with a 6.54 ERA, and his .331 opponent batting average is the highest of any starter on this card by a wide margin. Over his last five he has not completed six innings once, and his July 28 outing against San Diego was four innings on eight hits. Tampa Bay counters with Ian Seymour, a left-hander whose 10.34 strikeouts per nine is the second-best rate among Monday's starters. Seymour's arsenal is unusual: a changeup 30.5 percent of the time at 83.5 mph and a sweeper 23.8 percent at 81.3, with a four-seam fastball he uses only 26.3 percent of the time. He struck out twelve Yankees in 5.1 innings on July 7.

The Rays are 65-46 and lead the AL East, but the split behind that record is stark. Tampa Bay is 41-18 at home, the best home record in baseball, and 24-28 on the road. Denver in August is the least hospitable road venue in the sport for a team built around pitching and contact. Junior Caminero (.282/.373/.544, 30 home runs) and Yandy Díaz (.301) carry the offense, with Ryan Pepiot, Shane McClanahan, Gavin Lux and Jake Fraley all unavailable. Colorado is missing Kris Bryant, Chase Dollander and Jose Quintana.

Both of these clubs are chasing the same wild card berth, and one game separates them. Arizona is 59-53 and currently holds the spot; San Diego is 58-54 and sits a game back. The Padres are the hotter team by a distance, 8-2 in their last ten and winners of three straight after taking every game of a weekend series from the Giants by 7-0, 6-5 and 5-4. Arizona was shut out 5-0 in Cleveland on Sunday.

Michael King is the more accomplished of the two starters, 6-7 with a 3.38 ERA, a 1.17 WHIP and a .215 opponent average across 125.1 innings. His usage pattern is worth noting for a right-hander: a changeup 28.3 percent of the time at 86.3 mph and a sinker 28.1 percent at 92.9 mph, with the four-seam fastball down at 19.1 percent. He held the Dodgers to two earned runs in six innings on July 3, then gave up four earned and two homers to Colorado on July 28.

Brandon Pfaadt has been the best thing about a shredded Arizona rotation. He is 5-1 with a 4.00 ERA and only 21 walks in 72 innings, and his most recent start was seven scoreless innings against Pittsburgh on July 28 on 101 pitches. He needs to be good, because Corbin Burnes, Ryne Nelson, Blake Walston and Cristian Mena are on the 60-day injured list while Zac Gallen, Michael Soroka and Drey Jameson are on the 15-day. Corbin Carroll (.822 OPS, 16 homers, 15 steals) and Ketel Marte lead the lineup. San Diego, hitting .235 as a team, leans on Ty France (.889 OPS) and Fernando Tatis Jr. (26 steals), with Joe Musgrove, Nick Pivetta, Lucas Giolito and Jason Adam all on the shelf.