The World Series kicks off Tuesday night at 8 PM EDT, 5 PM PDT in Arlington, Texas with the Tampa Bay Rays playing the role of the visitors against the host Los Angeles Dodgers. Tyler Glasnow of the Rays faced Clayton Kershaw of the Dodgers.

Glasnow makes his seventh post-season start, and so far he pitched poorly. Glasnow blows away batters in these games, with thirty three strikeouts in 26 1/3 innings. He walked eleven, however, and gave up seven home runs. The last two numbers indicate why he doesn’t last long in games. On top of that, despite the high strikeout rate, he allows a ton of hits, 26 in total. Five of the nine extra-base hits he allowed came with men on base.

Kershaw owns an up and down record in the playoffs, with an overall 4.31 ERA in 35 appearances, 28 of those starts. Even this season, he mixed eight shutout innings against Milwaukee with three runs in six innings against the Padres and four runs in five innings against Atlanta. On the plus side, his three-true outcomes are 10.9 K/9, 0.9 BB per nine, and 1.42 HR per nine.

The Rays batters strike out a ton and walk a ton. Kershaw exploits the weakness and works against the strength. The Dodgers batters don’t strike out much, walk a lot, and hit a ton of home runs. All that works against Glasnow. Kershaw has suffered back spasms this season and this post-season, so I could see this game going as a blowout in favor of Los Angeles, or a high-scoring, close game.

Enjoy!