Wunderdog
Boston @ Chicago
Pick: Under 206
The Boston Celtics edged out the Cleveland Cavaliers for the top seed in the East. Here we are in Round 1 and the Cavaliers are up 3-0 in their series while the Celtics have lost two straight at home and are 0-2 in theirs. Meanwhile, Isaiah Thomas has to continue with the untimely death of his sister, and after going to Tacoma, WA to be with family he has returned for Game 3. It was tough in the first two, but after grieving with family it may be even tougher for him in Game 3. Without his offense, the Celtics have proven to have few options. The only alternative is to come in and buckle down on the defensive end. These teams have a long history of playing ugly defensive games in Chicago, and the last 43 meetings have produced a 27-15-1 mark to the UNDER, producing a grand total of an average of 192.1 points per game. Just three times in the last 15 played here has either team scored 106 points or more. Defense is going to have to get Boson back in this series, and with Thomas a tough choice on the road with what he has dealt with the past couple of days is going to be tough. Play the UNDER in this one.
Chip Chirimbes
Clippers at Jazz
Play: Clippers
Now, I know what I am watching and what I see is that the Jazz look better and play better than this Los Angeles team. Yes, the series is tied at 1-1 but the Clippers have yet to 'cover' and still somehow are favored in Salt Lake City where Utah is 29-12 on the season. These two have the exact same record and the Clippers are just 22-19 on the road. My point is, why have the bookmakers made L.A. the favorite as slight as it might be in this playoff game. The most likely reason is that Utah center Rudy Gobert remains questionable after injuring his knee in Game 1. When you realize 7-18-1 ATS in their last 26 meetings in Utah.
Robert Ferringo
Chicago (-1.5) over Cincinnati
At this point I think it will do the Cubs well to get out of Chicago. I think all of the hype for this season and all of the residual celebration from last year has clearly impacted this group. They are off to a sloppy start, going 6-7 as of Tuesday afternoon and opening just 2-5 at home. I think a trip to Cincinnati to face a division rival - in a game where there will likely be as many Cubs fans as Reds fans in the stadium - is just what they need. Chicago is an outstanding 84-41 in their last 125 divisional games. And last year the Cubs dominated the Reds, going 15-4 in the head-to-head matchup. The Cubs are 28-10 in their last 38 against Cincinnati. Jake Arrieta is on the mound for Chicago in this one and he is one of the best in the business. The long ball has victimized him early this season, giving up three home runs, but he has 21 strikeouts in just 18 innings and exactly one year ago to the date he threw a complete game shutout in Cincinnati against the Reds. Cincinnati's rotation is in absolute shambles right now and they don't even know who they are going to be able to start in this weekend series. That should set up well for a Cubs lineup that is off to a pretty ugly start. I think the Cubs break out the bats and bust them over Cincinnati's head here.
Indian Cowboy
Miami (-110) over San Diego
Take a close look at Miami to get it done over San Diego on Friday. You have a pitcher in Adam Conley who is talented who once pitched at Washington State. Conley had a 3.85 ERA in 2016 and had a 3.76 ERA in 2015. He has shown consistency over his last few years and is 2-1 to start this year with a 3.75 ERA, including giving up 3 runs in 6 innings via 4 hits. We like Conley against San Diego who has a questionable offense and consequently we like Miami as they have been playing quality baseball this year as they sport the 10th best offense and 12th best ERA in the league. Let's roll with Miami on the road for a solid win behind Conley.
Bryan Leonard
Toronto at Los Angeles
Play: Toronto +132
Time to step in and back the slumping Blue Jays as this line has gotten out of hand. Matt Latos makes his return to the majors and he's facing Alex Meyer. Meyer has been a hot prospect in the past but he didn't even make the club out of spring training. While everyone knows the struggles of the Jays, the Angels have theor own problems. No way you can lay this number with a team struggling like the host. Too much value on the dog here.
SPORTS WAGERS
SAN DIEGO +103 over Miami
After defeating the Diamondbacks again last night, San Diego is now 4-2 at home and they remain undervalued, especially here with Trevor Cahill (RHP) starting. Cahill has yet to start at Petco this season but in two road starts covering 11 innings, he struck out 15 batters with an elite 18% swing and miss rate and also elite 52% groundball rate. When Cahill is healthy, he has always quietly been one of the most skilled pitchers in the game and he’s up to his old tricks again. In September of 2015 he posted 11.2 K’s/9, 2.3 BB’s/9 and a 60% groundball rate and his numbers this year after two starts are almost precisely the same. At age 29, Cahill and his current skill set makes for an extremely attractive play at home taking back a price but what this market sees is Cahill’s 0-2 record and 4.76 ERA. What we see is elite skills with a tremendous 2.82 xERA.
Adam Conley (LHP) comes into this start with a 1-1 record and a 3.75 ERA, which are superior to Cahill’s numbers on paper. That’s sweet because the wrong pitcher is favored. Coming into spring training, Conley seemed a certainty for the Marlins rotation despite a lackluster 2016 that featured a 4.71 xERA with weak skills and weak command. Then came spring training exhibition games and Conley could only muster a 6.94 ERA in 11-plus innings, casting doubt on his role. In any event, win or lose here, Conley is not a good option as the chalk. He has walked five batters in 12 frames with nine K’s but four of those K’s came against opposition pitchers. His fastball tops off at 89 MPH and he also has a weak 34%/50% groundball/fly-ball split. The fact that he's still in the rotation might speak more about the Marlins' alternatives than with Conley's abilities so put him on your fade list and keep him there until the market adjusts.
COLORADO -1½ +215 over San Fran
We’re not going to go into a lot of details here regarding the pitchers because it matters not when playing at Coors Field. This is a continuation of our commitment to playing the underdog all season long at Coors Field on the ALTERNATIVE run line. What that means is that we are playing the remainder of Colorado’s home games this season and we’ll be playing the underdog in each game, whether it’s the Rocks or the opposition and we’ll be playing it regardless of who’s pitching. We’re suggesting that this wager has nothing but big profits in store. With totals being in the 10 to 12½ range daily at this venue, far more games are decided by two runs or more than one run and the underdog wins just as much as the favorite. The pitching matchups rarely matter because even the best get rocked at this park.
Seattle +113 over OAKLAND
The Mariners were a popular choice last night to beat Oakland with James Paxton (0.00 ERA after three starts) being a reasonable price against a starter, César Valdez, who hadn’t pitched in the majors since 2010 before last night’s start. Well, the A’s scored nine times in a 9-6 victory and now the market is not so anxious to get behind the Mariners again when it looks like Oakland has the superior starter. We are anxious to get behind the M’s because the starters do not concern us here.
The Mariners are high on our radar when taking back a price because their stock is low after winning just seven of their first 17 games. From our vantage point, this team will be well over .500 when the season ends. We’re suggesting that the Mariners are the only threat to beat Houston to win the AL West.
Prior to 2015, the Jack Zduriencik (Seattle’s GM) regime was an endless parade of designated hitters playing the outfield, second basemen converted to outfielders, Kendrys Morales acquisitions, rushed prospects, power obsessions, increasing paranoia, breakdowns in communication, and eventually near-anarchy but 2015 was going to be different. In lieu of outsmarting teams, the Mariners had finally acquiesced to trying to outspend them. Big-money free agents Robinson Cano and Nelson Cruz were in place, Felix Hernandez was filled with a lust for vengeance from losing the Cy Young award to Corey Kluber and an 87-win roster was fine tuned. It was time. In 2015 the Mariners lost 86 games. Mike Zunino was allowed 386 plate appearances while producing a .196 TAv. Fernando Rodney wandered into the forest, literally and metaphorically. Zduriencik was fired. One month later, Jerry Dipoto took over as GM.
From a fan perspective, Dipoto says all the right things. He addresses spin rates, knows about swing plane adjustments, talks about psychological profiles, and is hip to every advanced analytical, Statcast-fueled defensive metric you can name. He talks like a combination of aw-shucks-guy-next-door and dazzlingly handsome, silver-tongued baseball huckster. If House Dipoto had a crest, it would be two piercingly intelligent blue eyes on a field of teal, with the house words “Hi great to meet you that’s a fine question now let me tell you about a report I read recently on the subject!”
The days of Mark Trumbo, Mike Morse, and Nelson Cruz starting in right field are gone, replaced by a crowded stable of quality defensive outfielders in Leonys Martin, Jarrod Dyson, Mitch Haniger, Guillermo Heredia, and Ben Gamel. The trade to acquire shortstop Jean Segura pairs him with Robinson Cano and Kyle Seager to form three-fourths of an elite infield. It was Dipoto and company who decided in the middle of last season to convert Edwin Diaz to relief, giving the team an elite, cost-controlled arm at a time when the reliever market exploded. Mitch Hanigar, as it turns out, is a true stud. Once Cano, Nellie Cruz and Seager inevitably start hitting, the Mariners are an offensive explosion waiting to happen. The market, or most of it, is not aware of how good these Mariners are just yet and therefore the time to buy would be now before their stock skyrockets. This is a team to watch and a team to bet on and that's precisely what we'll be doing over the next while.
Scott Rickenbach
Chicago vs. Cincinnati
Play: Cincinnati +176
Big home dog line value in this one. Even though the Cubs are off of back to back wins they have only won 3 straight games once this season. As for the Reds, although they are off of back to back losses, they have not lost 3 straight games yet this season. It looks like the perfect spot to take a shot with another big dog as the Reds bullpen is 4-2 with a 2.43 ERA this season while the Cubs are 3-4 with a 3.53 ERA. Also, Cincinnati's Tim Adleman has pitched quite well in his two career starts against Chicago. The Cubs continue to be over-priced early this season. The defending World Champs had lost 4 straight before notching back to back wins their last two games. Jon Lester gets the start for the Cubs and certainly deserves respect. However, in his lone road start this season he walked 2 and allowed 7 hits in just 5 innings of work. In his most recent start at Cincinnati Lester gave up 5 earned runs in 5 innings. This one has great potential for an upset as the Cubs have allowed 4 runs or more in 6 straight games while the Reds, other than a 10 run outburst a week ago, have allowed just 2.6 runs per game in their other 10 games spanning the last week and a half!
Brandon Lee
Indians vs. White Sox
Play: White Sox +139
Chicago isn't suppose to be any good this year, but any team is worth backing when they are playing well over the course of a 162-game season. The White Sox are a respectable 7-7 and 5-3 over their last 8. I just think with this being a division home game, there's just too much value at this price to pass up on. Cleveland is being way overvalued by the books and are certainly getting to much respect here with how poorly today's starter Corey Kluber has looked early, posting a 6.38 ERA in 3 starts. I know Chicago starter Jose Quintana hasn't been any better, but he's the ace of this staff and more than capable of coming out and dominating. Note he got a 2.53 ERA over 19 career appearances against the Indians and had a 2.41 ERA against them last year.
Jimmy Boyd
Cardinals vs. Brewers
Play: Under 8½
I think we are getting some exceptional value here with this total in Friday's NL Central clash between the Cardinals and Brewers. St Louis will give the ball to veteran Adam Wainwright, who is coming off a couple of rough outings against the National and Yankees, both on the road. I'm expecting a much better start here against a familiar foe, who he owns a 2.21 ERA against in 28 career starts. That includes 3 starts last year, where he allowed a whopping 2 runs in 22 innings of work.
Milwaukee will counter with Wily Peralta, who has been rock solid for the Brewers to start the season. Peralta is 3-0 with a 2.65 ERA in 3 starts and has yet to allow a run at home this season. He faces a Cardinals offense that is only averaging 3.3 runs/game. It's also worth noting that conditions will favor the starters, as it's not going to be very warm out and the wind will be slightly blowing in.
John Martin
Rockets vs. Thunder
Play: Under 224½
I think with the series moving back to Oklahoma City tonight that the Thunder will control the tempo in Game 3. They won't be looking to run with the Rockets, instead slowing this game down and giving themselves their best chance to win. The first two games in this series saw 205 and 226 combined points for an average of 215.5, so I think there is some nice value with the UNDER 224.5 in Game 3. And 24 of the last 30 meetings in this series have seen 224 or fewer combined points to boot. The UNDER is 9-3-1 in Rockets last 13 road games. The UNDER is 6-1 in Thunder's last seven home games. The UNDER is 9-2 in the last 11 meetings in OKC.
Mike Menase
Indians vs. White Sox
Play: White Sox +139
The Indians are simply getting way too much respect from oddsmakers.
Kluber has been out of his usual form so far in the season and he has not given much hope of that changing. He has pitched poorly at home and away, at daytime and at nighttime. His main problem is his inability this year to induce ground balls. In his career, he induces at a nearly 45% rate ground balls, but this year only 30%. This means that batters are making great contact with his pitches and are achieving extra-base hits. This means that Abreu, who has hit three homeruns against Kluber in 33 at-bats, and Cabrera, who has achieved four doubles against Kluber in 25 at-bats, should have strong performances today. The White Sox do tend to struggle more against right-handed pitchers. However, they did knock around Josh Tomlin for seven runs in 1.2 innings. Tomlin's problem was, indeed, his inability to induce ground balls. And he even did a better job of doing so than Kluber has been doing. On the season, Tomlin induces ground balls at a 53% rate, but when he struggled against the White Sox, he only did so at a 38% rate. Because Kluber is struggling to induce ground balls, we can expect the White Sox to pound him.
Quintana, granted, has been struggling as well. But he also has upside. His first home start was a poor performance. But we can perhaps chalk that up to mental issues--as he was slated to make the start the day before, before the match-up got pushed back. His second outing at home was much more effective, giving up just two ER in 6.1 innings vs the Twins. He also had seven strikeouts and one walk, compared to five walks in Minnesota. Quintana is at his best in front of the White Sox faithful. Last year, for instance, his ERA was 2.77 at home compared to 3.58 on the road. Quintana is more comfortable at home where he is able to enjoy better command of his pitches. Indians batters indeed match-up decently well with Quintana, as they enjoy a .759 ops against him in over 200 at-bats. They have also been able to be productive on the road. Nonetheless, Quintana has upside going into this match-up because of his consistency to perform at home. Quintana's ERA, one may say, is a bit inflated because he had to deal with his first start being re-scheduled--an interruption of routine that Kluber deals with today, because he was originally supposed to pitch yesterday. And because he performed poorly on the road--or really in just one inning on the road, in which he gave up five runs. Quintana, besides his first inning in Minnesota, went 4.2 innings without giving up a run. I hope for an adequate performance today from Quintana at home. I expect him to pitch better than Kluber, who has struggled more against White Sox batters than Quintana has against Cleveland batters, and who has struggled more significantly and more consistently on this season than Quintana.
Not only do the White Sox enjoy the advantage in this pitching match up, but their bullpen has also been outstanding so far. Their bullpen is 3-1 with an ERA of 1.41 while the Indians' bullpen is 3-0 with a 3.17 ERA. At home, both teams scored an equal amount of runs past the sixth inning. But overall, the White Sox' bullpen has been outperforming that of the Indians.
Chase Diamond
Clippers vs. Jazz
Play: Clippers
This game features the 1-1 Clippers at the 1-1 Jazz. There is no way the Clippers are gonna let themselves lose this series and with that tonight is a must win game. Jazz covered the first two and I think the books have adjusted their number in this one but the public is 50/50 betting this one yet this line is moving toward showing the Clippers are the sharp play.
Jack Jones
Cardinals vs. Brewers
Play: Cardinals -117
The St. Louis Cardinals are currently undervalued in my opinion due to their poor 6-10 start. The Milwaukee Brewers have gotten off to a solid 9-8 start and are starting to get too much respect from the books.
I know that Adam Wainwright has struggled in the early going, but now he's up against a team has has dominated in the past. Wainwright is 14-8 with a 2.21 ERA and 0.968 WHIP in 18 career starts against the Brewers, including 2-0 with a 0.69 ERA in his last four, giving up just 2 earned runs in 26 innings. St. Louis is 5-0 in Wainright's last five starts at Milwaukee.
Wily Peralta went 5-10 with a 4.72 ERA in 2015 and 7-11 with a 4.86 ERA in 2016. So his 3-0 start with a 2.65 ERA thus far in 2017 is clearly an aberration. And Peralta hasn't had much success against the Cardinals, going 4-10 with a 4.74 ERA and 1.430 WHIP in 16 career starts against them. Milwaukee is 0-7 in Peralta's last seven starts against St. Louis.
Wainwright is 30-10 (+20.2 Units) against the money line on the road when the total is 8.5 to 10 in his career. Wainwright is 58-26 (+23.3 Units) against the money line vs. NL teams scoring 4.5 or more runs/game on the season in his career. The Cardinals are 40-15 in Wainwright's last 55 starts vs. NL Central opponents. St. Louis is 53-25 in the last 78 meetings.
Matt Josephs
Marlins vs. Padres
Play: Marlins -112
The Marlins look for better success in San Diego as they begin a series with the Padres on Friday. Trevor Cahill makes his first home start of the season, third overall. He has allowed seven runs and nine hits in just over 11 innings of work failing to win in either outing. Cahill is 2-2 with a 4.82 ERA in six starts against the Fish who will be getting back Adeiny Hechevarria. With him and Martin Prado back, the lineup is intact and it's one of the best in the National League. Miami is hitting .275 against right-handed starters scoring 5.1 runs per game. San Diego's bullpen is pretty bad so Cahill won't get much help. Adam Conley has allowed four runs and five hits in 11 innings. The southpaw faced the Pads just once out of the bullpen. San Diego entered Thursday night hitting .192 in five games against left-handed starters. Their lineup isnt very scary outside of Wil Myers and Manuel Margot. I'll take the Fish to get the road win on Friday.
Matt Fargo
Cardinals vs. Brewers
Play: Brewers +110
Milwaukee took the opener of this series yesterday to move over .500 following a two-game losing streak. The Brewers offense has been on a solid run as they have averaged 6.0 rpg over their last eight games and have a great opportunity to keep that going. They are the underdogs here despite owning a big pitching edge as this line is based on name and name only. The Cardinals are just 1-6 on the road this season while going 1-5 in their last six games against teams with a winning record. Adam Wainwright is the name pitcher mentioned earlier and his best days are long gone. He is 0-3 with a 7.24 ERA and 2.20 WHIP in his first three starts which came after a pretty poor 2016 season where he posted a career high 4.62 ERA over 33 starts. The Brewers are 6-1 in their last seven games against right-handed starters. Milwaukee counters with Wily Peralta who has had the exact opposite start as he is 3-0 with a 2.65 ERA and 1.12 WHIP in his three outings. Peralta was tremendous in the second half of 2016 where he posted a 2.92 ERA and 1.15 WHIP in 10 starts after the All Star Break and through Cactus League play where he had a 0.71 ERA over 12.2 innings. The Cardinals are 2-11 in their last 13 games against starters with a WHIP less than 1.15.