Daulton Varsho was the name to watch when the Toronto Blue Jays met the Milwaukee Brewers on Tuesday, April 14, with the preview pointing to another big night for the outfielder against hard fastballs. Jacob Misiorowski was expected to lean on a four-seamer around 98 mph and had used it at a 62% rate, a profile that put the matchup squarely in Varsho’s lane.
Varsho had led Blue Jays hitters against the four-seamer with a.365 average and a 60% hard-hit rate, and he had a hit in four straight games while batting.412 over that stretch. The prediction went further, saying he could be in line for his third home run in four games if the pattern held.
That was the offensive angle in a game that also carried a clear pitching edge for Toronto. Kevin Gausman had held Brewers hitters to a.177 average and a.505 OPS in his career, and the last time he faced Milwaukee he worked seven complete innings and allowed four hits. William Contreras, one of the Brewers’ most dangerous bats, was 0-for-6 against Gausman with five strikeouts, and over the last two seasons he carried a 40% strikeout rate against the splitter.
The numbers gave the game a split personality: one side built around a hitter in form, the other around a starter who had already shown he could control Milwaukee. Toronto’s recent tendency also pointed toward a slower first half, with the Blue Jays going under the first-five-innings team total in 12 of their last 15 games. That betting trend sat beside the Varsho call and made the opener look less like a showcase for the full lineup than a test of whether one hot bat could keep changing the script.
What made the preview stand out was how directly it tied the Brewers score outlook to pitch type and form rather than reputation. Misiorowski’s fastball usage met Varsho’s best results, while Gausman’s track record against Milwaukee sat there as the counterweight. For Tuesday night, the game came down to whether Toronto’s recent power surge and Milwaukee’s familiar problems against Gausman would settle the matchup before the Brewers could catch up.
