Bryan Leonard | MLB Total
double-dime bet -924 TAM / 923 TEX – OVER 8.5
Analysis:
923 TEXAS @ TAMPA BAY
It should be a good day to be a hitter when Texas and Tampa Bay open up a weekend series at the Trop. Joe Saunders will take the mound as part of the beleaguered Rangers starting rotation and he’ll be opposed by Jake Odorizzi. Saunders is proof that no matter what your ERA looks like, if you’re durable enough to throw 180 innings with your left arm, you can find work. That left arm produced a 5.26 ERA last season with the Mariners in 32 starts. To put into perspective how bad Saunders was, look at his road splits. Opposing batters hung a .330/.387/.538 slash line on him with a .400 wOBA. To put that into even more perspective, here’s the list of players that posted a .400 wOBA last season: Miguel Cabrera, Mike Trout, Chris Davis, Paul Goldschmidt, Jayson Werth, Troy Tulowitzki, Joey Votto, and David Ortiz. Righties slugged .559 against Saunders.
The hits just kept coming off of Saunders in the second half of last season as opposing batters hit .351/.413/.569 and had a .424 wOBA. Only Miguel Cabrera had a wOBA above .424 last season. Mike Trout’s was .423, so hitters off of Joe Saunders in the second half were essentially all Mike Trout. While Saunders may not be that awful, there’s absolutely no reason to believe that he’s going to be a lot better than that. Also, in his second-to-last Spring Training appearance, Saunders allowed nine runs and attributed the struggles to a “dead arm”. Not only are the numbers alarming, but Saunders may not even be healthy.
Jake Odorizzi is a pitch-to-contact fly ball guy who would do well to post an ERA around 3.75 this season. There will be spots to back a guy like Odorizzi, but a lineup with a good amount of power like the Rangers doesn’t seem like the place to do so. While Saunders is bad enough to keep us from going against Odorizzi at an attractive plus-money price, we expect the Rangers to also score some runs.
In a small sample size of 95 batters, lefties have slugged .494 against Odorizzi. It’s a small sample, but it does speak to how unrefined Odorizzi’s breaking pitches are. The Rangers are full of veteran hitters that will force the youngster into the strike zone with fastballs and that should bode well for them. Over the course of the season, the Rangers should have a lot of success with righties and we’re banking on them to do that on Friday night.
PLAY: TEX/TB – OVER