Logan Webb and the Giants takes on Gerrit Cole and the Yankees in The Bronx in one of the first games of the new season. In the last two seasons as a full-time starter, Webb proved capable to limiting all elements of offense. Opponents hit just .237/.292/.340 against him. He allowed just 20 home runs in a little over 340 innings. Cole allowed 57 home runs in the same time period, but due to his .264 opposition OBP, 36 of those came with the bases empty.

The Blue Jays and Alek Manoah meet Miles Mikolas in St. Louis in a 4 PM EDT game against the Cardinals. Manoah quickly rose as one of the best pitchers in the game. His 2.60 ERA over the last two seasons ranks third in the majors (300 IP). With low strikeout and walk rates, batters make contact against Mikolas, but a high ground ball rate with good defense behind him held his BABIP to just .278.

At the same time, what might be the best pitching match-up of the day takes place in Miami as Max Scherzer and the Mets take on Sandy Alcantara and the Marlins. The ERA rankings linked above show Scherzer first and Alcantara sixth over the last two seasons. Alcantara has the added advantage of being an iron man, pitching 36 2/3 innings more than anyone else in that time frame, the only pitcher over 400 innings.

Finally, two teams trying to break a World Championship drought meet in Seattle as Shane Bieber of the Guardians faces Luis Castillo of the Mariners. Bieber greatly decreased his walk rate in 2022. His strikeout rate went down, also but not enough to hurt his hit prevention. He wound up with the best season of his career. Castillo has always been good at limiting power, but had his best season in 2022, limiting hitters to a .332 slugging percentage.

Enjoy!