Blue Jays vs. Orioles prediction and odds for Thursday, June 15 (Baltimore Will Tee Off)

On Thursday, the Toronto Blue Jays and Baltimore Orioles will wrap up their AL East rivalry series in Baltimore. The Orioles are still comfortably in second place in the division, but all five teams look like playoff contenders midway through June.

For the series finale the Blue Jays will send lefty, Yusei Kikuchi to the mound to make his 14th start of the season. Kikuchi is 6-2 with a 4.34 ERA and will be matched up against Tyler Wells who is 5-2 with a 3.24 ERA in his 12 starts. Let’s take a look at the odds. 

Blue Jays vs. Orioles odds, run line and total

Blue Jays vs. Orioles prediction and pick

The Blue Jays have done a lot of winning with Kikuchi on the mound this season, but he is a pitcher I’m going to be fading going forward. Kikuchi doesn’t go deep into games so he hasn’t really gotten exposed yet, but his FIP is 5.87 and his expected ERA is 5.28, both much higher than his ERA. He is in the ninth percentile of expected slugging with a .513 and the 11th percentile in terms of average exit velocity.

Kikuchi is a pitcher that allows a lot of hits and gets hit really hard. He has allowed 68 hits in 66.1 innings of work along with 21 walks. So he allows a lot of traffic and has already given up 18 home runs this season. That is the most of any pitcher in baseball tied with Lance Lynn and Jordan Lyles who are both disasters on the mound. 

The Orioles offense has been red hot and Ryan Mountcastle and Anthony Santander absolutely crush lefties, so I feel very confident taking the O’s in the series finale. 

Follow all Josh Yourish’s bets HERE

Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change