67-47-2 +24.89
3-2 down a hair yesterday, all 5 games decided late. Too bad the Mets couldn't score bases loaded 1 out bottom ninth but I'm probably the only person in the world who is thankful the Royals, Mariners and D-backs all won last night.
Thursday night June 22nd, 2006 I'm at a bar with a few friends, watching the Twins/Astros game on ESPN featuring Liriano and Clemens. Minnesota was an unpopular road favorite, the 7.5 total was the lowest on the board and a popular over. So of I course I have 5 inning Twins and under plays going, and after it's 2-0 Twins end of the 5th with Francisco dealing I turn to my buddy who had the same plays and said 'Where can I buy options on him throwing a no-hitter someday?' I was thinking of this conversation while watching him get rocked against Tampa last week with Minny as my play of the day, happy there was no such option to be bought. Then he goes and throws one in a hitters park at a team that generally hits lefties well at home...go figure.
CHICAGO WHITE SOX -160 (4.40/2.75)
Anyone really following had to know this was coming today. Unpopular favorite, home favorite off home shutout, home favorite off being no-hit, Twins awful in Blackburn's road starts. If the head to head game logs for Danks and Blackburn weren't a little shaky this play might be bigger.
25 total no-hitters since 1998 before last night. Just 5 occurrences of home teams who were just no-hit being home favorites in the next game...all against the team that no-hit them, 3 of them last year:
6/26/10 Tampa (Price) beats Arizona (Kennedy) after Edwin Jackson's road no-hitter for D-Backs on 6/25 (-220 fave)
5/30/10 Florida (Sanchez) beats Philly (Moyer) after Roy Halladay's road no-hitter for Phillies on 5/29 (-132 fave)
4/18/10 Atlanta (Jurrjens) beats Colorado (G. Smith) after Ubaldo Jiminez's road no-hitter for Rockies on 4/17 (-136 fave)
6/12/03 Yankees (Wells) beat Houston (J. Robertson) after Astros combined road no-hitter on 6/11 (-185 fave)
5/13/01 San Diego (K. Jarvis) loses to Florida (Penny) after AJ Burnett's road no-hitter for Marlins on 5/12 (-110 fave)
5/4/11 White Sox (Danks) ?????? Minnesota after Liriano's road no-hitter for Twins on 5/3 (-160 fave)
It's been almost 10 years since a home favorite off being no-hit at home lost, and it was a Padres team that was no-hit again later in the year, had home shutouts all over their game log, and were barely favored over an underrated Marlins and young Brad Penny (with Kevin Jarvis of all people). The three from last year are all very similar to today. Ace type guys (Jiminez, Halladay, Ed. Jackson, Liriano) throw road no-hitters against pretty good offensive teams, and the team that got no-hit had very good young highly touted guys going the next day...Jurrjens, Sanchez, Price...and now Danks.
Nick Blackburn career 5.35 road ERA, almost 2 runs worse than at home. 7.10 road since beginning of last year, Twins 7-12. Twins 16-36 in his career road starts. White Sox are 0-6 in Danks starts this year despite his sub 4 ERA and 4 quality starts. Its time for them to get on the board for him, even if they are a couple games under .500 behind him at home since his rookie year. None of those were off being no-hit.
Ozzie and the White Sox are getting killed by the media. They know you don't have to throw a no-hitter back to make it 1-1, like Ozzie said no-no's are big for history and the record books but it's just 1 loss for the team that got no-hit. Perfect example of the general public having short memories is the Twins being a popular road dog for just the 4th time this year. Twins are 0-3 in these games so far...losing with Pavano at Toronto first game of the year, Blackburn at Tampa when Tampa was cold, and Pavano at Arietta which was right around 50-50. Wagerline had a 55-45% split for the White Sox last night, and now it's about 55-45 the other way. Pavano twice and now Blackburn twice make up Minny's 4 popular road dog chances. White Sox first chance as a clear cut unpopular favorite (they barely were a couple night ago against BAL)