Toronto at Washington

Washington enters loaded for bear, and I'm not going to soft-pedal it: C.J. Abrams has been the best hitter in the sport over the last week, 17 for 30 with seven home runs, and James Wood added two more homers Sunday as the Nationals took the series from Arizona to sit a game out of a wild-card spot. Toronto is the clearly worse team on the season, 48-58 to Washington's 54-52, and Max Scherzer returns from the injured list carrying a 10.23 ERA through six starts this year, an ugly number for a future Hall of Famer. I'm not hiding from any of that, because the price still has room in it. Scherzer's final tune-up at Triple-A Buffalo last week produced seven strikeouts in a short outing, stuff still missing bats even as results lag, and that gap between stuff and results is exactly what a sharp price accounts for before the public catches up. Washington's offense is running hotter than any seven-game stretch sustains, and Toronto still gets paid at plus money in a first meeting between these two teams with no history weighing on it either way. At plus-117, Toronto needs to win this a shade under half the time to break even, well within range against a team riding an outlier week. Take the Blue Jays tonight as my Game of the Week pick.