SJSharks - Sunday Bases

Quote Originally Posted by SJSharks99:

Philly/Cards O8.5 (-105): These 2 teams have been held in check in the first two games of there weekend series and I fully expect a wild game on Sunday. The starting pitching match up will feature Lance Lynn and Vance Worley. The reason I love this over has a lot to do with Lance Lynn's splits. On the year Lynn ranks as one of the worst pitchers against lefties (thanks to Si1ly sheets), Lynn is #169. Left handed batters are batting .40 points higher (.280) overall against him. His biggest struggles is 40 free passes surrendered to lefties, compared to just 8 vs righties. He has allowed double the amount of homers this year vs left handed batters. Even though the Phillies have struggled lately in terms of offensive production, I fully expect Charlie Manual to stack an already lefty heavy line up. The Phillies Howard, Utley, Rollins, Piere etc. will have a very good chance of success against Lynn who struggles against lefties. Lynn has also struggled overall lately with a 1-1 record and a 6.35 era in his last 3 outings. His WHIP of 1.88 has gotten him in trouble. 4 out of his last 6 starts on the road resulted in the opponent scoring 5 or more runs against him. On the mound for the Phillies will be Vance Worley who is 1-1 with a 3.94 era in his last 3 outings. Worley has struggled big time at home this season where he is 2-4 with an era of 5.05. He has a WHIP of 1.56 at home, and has surrendered 11 home runs all year with 7 of those home runs coming at home. Also, all 7 of those have come during day games. He will have a tall task against ahead of him against a Cardinals line up who ranks #3 in all of baseball vs right handed pitching. In terms of bullpen play, the Cardinals have been spotty all year (better as of late), meanwhile the Phillies were good in the early goes, but they have tailed off big time lately. If I had to lean to a side in this one, id of course lean towards the Cardinals, but I feel pretty confident both teams will score at least 4 a piece and ill have a better return on a -105 over play vs a -125 side play on the Cardinals.



Rays/Twins U8 (100): My initial lean on this game was to ride the hot wave of the Tampa Bay Rays. But the more I looked into it, the more I liked the under. The Rays have put up some decent #s recently but those #s also came against awful pitchers such as Cole De Vries and Henderson Alvarez. In Saturday's game Nick Blackburn held them in check only allowing 2 runs, this is something the Rays do more often, rather than light up the scoreboard. They are better with Longoria back of course, but still they are a team that relies on there pitching to win games, not offensive shootouts. In Sunday's game they will be going against a very good left handed pitcher in the Twins Scott Diamond. On the year Diamond is 10-5 with a 2.91 era. He has pitched very well in his last 3 outings with a 2-1 record and a 1.93 era. He has enjoyed home cooking this year where he is 6-2 with a 2.44 era. He has also preferred pitching in the day where he has a 5-1 mark and a 2.01 era. A large part of his home success is a solid WHIP of 1.01, and it's been even better as of late with a microscopic 0.81 in his last 3 outings. Another thing I like is that his splits vs right handed and left handed batters is about even, so we won't have to worry about a stacked line up from either side of the plate. Diamond will also be facing the Rays for the 1st time ever, so he will have major advantage navigating through a Rays line up that has never seen him before. The Rays also rank #24 in the MLB vs left handed pitching. On the other side of the mound will feature James Shields. On the year Shields is 10-7 with a 4.08 era, but he has pitched very well as of late. In his last 3 outings Shields is 2-1 with a 2.35 era. He has been successful because he isn't allowing base runners, just like his counterpart in this affair, Shields also has a microscopic WHIP of 0.74 in his last 3 starts. In his last 17 innings of work he has allowed 1 run and 5 hits, with a very very impressive 17-1 strike out to walk ratio. Shields has double digit strike outs in 3 of his last 4 outings with 37 total in those starts. Shields will be making his #2 start his season vs the Twins, with the first one being a very successful one where he went 8 strong innings allowing just 1 run, on 5 hits. I think we will have a pitchers dual in this contest with lots of 0s across the board.


A's/White Sox U8 (-115): This game will feature the extremely red hot Bartolo Colon squaring off against the young phenom Chris Sale. Let's start with Bartolo, he has been on absolute fire lately. In his last 3 outing Colon has a 0.00 era. I had to do a double take, but it still said 0.00. He has gone 20 innings in a row without allowing a run. This made me dig deeper into Colon's season numbers and I was actually very impressed. Colon has only 2 starts in his last 8 where he allowed 4 runs, and those 2 starts came against the Texas Rangers and the New York Yankees. Considering he held both of those 2 power houses to 4 runs a piece, that's not too shabby at all. The other 6 starts he allowed 1 run 3 times, and 0 runs 3 times, which is the current run he is on. He will be facing a White Sox line up that will be missing there heart n soul Paul Konerko. I wouldn't be too surprised if Ventura also sat another key offensive weapon such as Dunn, Rios, AJ or Youk. While I obviously don't expect Bartolo to make a 4th consecutive start not allowing a run, he should be in a line for a very good outing. On the other side of the mound we have Chris Sale. Obviously his seasonal numbers speak for themselves. If you look at his recent outings, it would look like he is struggling and he very well might be. However those struggles have all occurred on the road. In his most recent outing at home on 8/6 against the Royals, Sale went 8 strong innings, allowing 2 runs on 7 hits, while striking out 7 and not allowing a single walk. On the year he is 6-2 with a 1.71 era at home, and he has enjoyed days starts where he is 6-2 with a 2.37 era. Sale's success at home has been due to his outstanding 0.85 WHIP. He will be facing an A's line up that rank #20th in the league against right handed pitching. This will be his 2nd start against the A's this year, in the first outing he went 8 strong, allowing 2 runs on 2 hits, while striking out 5 and not allowing any walks. Look for both starters to go deep in this game, with the runs being at a premium.


The above 5 plays on a small parlaying paying 20-1