In a hotly-anticipated rematch of the 2015 ALDS, the Blue Jays and Rangers will meet again in the 2016 ALDS. Last season, the Blue Jays prevailed in a white-knuckled five-game series. This time around, however, the Rangers enter having put up the better record in the regular season. As we get set for this one, let's have a look at the essentials ...

First, here's the schedule and broadcast information for the Blue Jays vs. Rangers best-of-five ALDS matchup. All start times are Eastern Time.

Date Time Venue Starting Pitchers TV Streaming Radio
Gm. 1 Thurs., Oct. 6 4:30 p.m. Globe Life Park
 Marco Estrada vs. Cole Hamels TBS TBS.com
 ESPN Radio
Gm. 2
 Fri., Oct. 7 1:00 p.m. Globe Life Park
 J.A. Happ vs. Yu Darvish
 TBS TBS.com ESPN Radio
Gm. 3
 Sun., Oct. 9 7:30 p.m. Rogers Centre
 TBA vs. Aaron Sanchez
 TBS TBS.com ESPN Radio
Gm. 4*
 Mon., Oct. 10 TBA Rogers Centre
 TBA vs. TBA
 TBS TBS.com
 ESPN Radio
Gm. 5*
 Weds., Oct. 12 TBA Globe Life Park
 TBA vs. TBA
 TBS TBS.com
 ESPN Radio

In the regular season, the Rangers went 95-67 and won the AL West by 9.0 games over the Mariners. The Blue Jays, meantime, went 89-73 and took until the final day of the regular season to clinch a wild card berth. Now here are few more things to know about the ALDS ...

This one of baseball's most intense recent rivalries

This surely isn't breaking news to you, but it's worth emphasizing as we get set for this series. The first shot across the bow came during the seventh inning of Game 5 of last year's ALDS, when Jose Bautista unfurled The Bat-Flip That Launched A Thousand Ships ...

The Rangers weren't necessarily fond of Bautista's exuberance on that decisive blast, which brings to the baseball events of May 15 of this year ...

Yes, those simmering, mutual hostilities begat The Right Cross Heard 'Round The World. Now, it's not uncommon for two teams that don't like each other and have a history to get together in a high-stakes encounter and have nothing happen outside of actual baseball. That will probably be the case here, but the tantalizing possibility of some unsanctioned activities. In conclusion ...

The Blue Jays won the season series

During the 2016 regular season, the Jays took four of seven head-to-head games against the Rangers. Over those seven games, the Jays outscored Texas by a hefty margin of 36-21. In those seven games, however, the Blue Jays faced neither Cole Hamels nor Yu Darvish, who will make up half of the Texas ALDS rotation. So that's something to bear in mind.

The Rangers have a much stronger roster now than when they last played the Blue Jays

The Rangers and Jays were done playing each other by May 15. In addition to the Toronto-friendly pitching matchups noted above, there's also the fact that the Rangers' roster is much stronger right now than it was back then. The bullpen's been improved by the call-up of Matt Bush (he was summoned to the majors just in time for the second Jays-Rangers series) and the return to health of Tanner Scheppers. Jeremy Jeffress may also wind up as a playoff contributor. In the lineup, the pre-deadline additions of Jonathan Lucroy and Carlos Beltran directly addressed to significant holes, and the surge that Carlos Gomez has enjoyed since being plucked from the scrap heap appears to be sustainable. In other words, this is a significantly better Texas roster than the Jays encountered during the regular season.

The Blue Jays put up a better run differential against a tougher schedule

The Rangers indeed barged to 95 wins during the regular season, but on the season they outscored their opponents by just eight runs overall. At the fundamental runs scored and runs allowed level, that makes them more of an 82-win team. In large part, it's the Rangers' historic 36-11 mark in one-run games that allowed them to outplay their run differential. The problem is that success in one-run games doesn't have a lot of sustainability or carryover. While, as noted, the Texas roster is stronger right now than it's ever been, their lofty win total might be a tad misleading. The Jays, meanwhile, authored a +93 run differential this season. So while they won 89 games, they played, at least at the level of the run differential, like a 91-win team.

As well, it's worth noting that the Jays' body of work came against a generally tougher schedule. This season, the Jays' opponents had an average winning percentage of .506, which ranked sixth in MLB. The Rangers' opponents in 2016 had an average winning percentage of .503, which ranked 13th. Obviously, that's not much of a difference, but it's something. Stated another way, the Jays played 59 games against teams that wound up with a losing record, while Texas played 71 such contests.

The Rangers have home-field advantage

Home-field advantage in baseball of course amounts to nothing more than the right to play a potential final game of a given series at home. So with an eye toward a possible ALDS Game 5, let's point out that the Rangers this season were 53-28 with a +34 run differential at home and just 42-39 with a -24 run differential on the road. On the other side, Toronto in 2016 was 46-35 at home with a +38 run differential at home and 43-38 with a +55 run differential on the road.

CBS Sports predictions

What would a preview post be without some predictions? Here's what the five CBS Sports baseball scribes expect the outcome of this ALDS to be:

R.J. Anderson Mike Axisa Jonah Keri Dayn Perry Matt Snyder
ALDS Winner
No. of Games 4 5
 4 5 5

With five writers making picks, that's as much of an even split as you can get. Also of note is that a majority of us expect the series to go the full five games. Here's hoping.