SPORTSWAGERS
MLB
San Diego @ PHILADELPHIA
San Diego/PHILADELPHIA under 7 -104
(Risking 2.08 units - To Win: 2.00)
Does anyone remember just how good Cole Hamels can be? Hamels' rough start to 2013, captured by that first half high ERA set the narrative for the whole year. He got off to another difficult start this year but his skills tell a different story. In fact, Hamels’ skills remain remarkably consistent and elite and they are touching new highs right now. Over his last six starts covering 43 innings, Hamels has struck out 45 batters and posted an ERA of 2.11, which is right in line with his 2.39 xERA. His groundball/line-drive/fly-ball profile of 53%/18%/34% over that same stretch shows the difficulty batters are having hitting anything hard off him. In fact, Hamels’ groundball rate in his last start was 80%, as he absolutely breezed through 7.2 innings at Cincinnati. He’ll now face a Padres team that is seeing BB’s and that is dead last in the majors with a BA of .210 against southpaws.
Then there’s Tyson Ross. His huge breakout is masked only by his poor team. Ross has found command of a beastly slider and has become one of the toughest starters to hit in the NL. Ross began his skills surge in the 2nd half of last season and has not slowed down in the slightest. He has 77 K’s in 81 innings, an elite 13% swing and miss rate and the highest groundball tilt in the major leagues at 61%. Over his last five starts, Ross has struck out 32 batters in 30 innings with a groundball/fly-ball split of 64%/20%. For this one to go over, one of these offenses has to go off because the other is very likely going to get a gem thrown against them.
Cleveland @ KANSAS CITY
Cleveland +111 over KANSAS CITY
(Risking 2 units - To Win: 2.22)
2:10 PM EST. Trevor Bauer has only made five starts since his call-up in May, but he certainly made the most of them with a BB/K split of 11/35 in 28 innings. Bauer has been a high-profile prospect since taken in the first round of the 2011 draft out of UCLA. Traded from Arizona to Cleveland prior to 2013, he took a big step back at Triple-A Columbus. He struggled to limit walks and keep the ball in the ballpark but much of his 2013 struggles can be attributed to a groin injury. An unlucky 31% hit rate and high 17% hr/f have both hurt his ERA (4.08) and WHIP (1.29) but he’ll now face a Royals team that is dead last in the majors in home runs. Also note that Bauer’s last four starts came against Texas, Colorado, Baltimore and Detroit and he’ll now take a big step down in class. This kid has a high ceiling.
Yordano Ventura had recent concerns around his elbow and thus was skipped for one turn in the rotation. He came back in his last outing and was only able to muster one K in six innings. Over his last three starts, he has a 7/5 K/BB, while allowing 11 ER over 14.2 IP. In seven home starts, he is 1-4 with a 4.25 ERA and 1.39 WHIP over 36 IP. Over his last five starts, Ventura has posted a 5.27 ERA along with a 1.61 WHIP. This little guy with the big arm (fastball touches 100 MPH) may be a pitcher in peril and it’s worth nothing that his secondary offerings are definitely a work in progress. The opposing Indians have a top-5 OPS (.754) when facing right handed pitching and the Royals have dropped five of the last six games that Ventura has started.
Boston @ BALTIMORE
Boston +113 over BALTIMORE
(Risking 2 units - To Win: 2.26)
Wei-Yin Chen has four pure quality starts in 12 tries this season. Yeah, he doesn’t walk many and yeah he usually gives the Orioles a chance to win but a 4.13 ERA along with a 1.32 WHIP make this very average pitcher unappealing as the chalk. In 39 innings at Camden Yards, Chen has a BAA of .288. In eight night games, his BAA is .297. Chen is a pitcher that relies heavily on his defense and good fortune, as the ball is almost always in play when he pitches. As a pooch throwing for a team with a good offense, Chen does have value when offered a tag but that’s not the case here.
Rubby De La Rosa has made just two starts but in those 13 innings he has walked just two batters while whiffing 13. Those 13 K’s are supported by his elite 14% swing and miss rate. De La Rosa has experienced a long road back after TJ surgery in 2011 and he’s looking stronger with each passing week. De La Rosa owns pure arm strength and can light up radar guns with his fastball that’ll sit between 93-98 mph and is tough to hit. He throws with whip-like arm action which gives him deception and pitch movement. De La Rosa also uses a slider and changeup. When on, his sharp slider exhibits nasty action and he throws it for strikes consistently. In his two starts, De La Rosa has an xERA of 2.66 to go along with a an elite groundball/fly-ball split of 54%/26%. De La Rosa has a much higher ceiling than Chen and is one of the best “but-low” targets on the market. This is true value.
Arizona @ HOUSTON
Arizona +111 over HOUSTON
(Risking 2 units - To Win: 2.22)
Pitching for the Astros, Dallas Keuchel has been undervalued the entire year…….until now. We’re always mindful of the buy-low/sell high theory and that comes into play here. Keuchel is 7-3 with a 2.50 ERA after 12 starts. The Astros have won seven of his last nine starts and overall in those 12 starts, Keuchel has been a dog 11 times and favored just one time. That one time he was favored occurred at home when he was -114 against Chris Tillman and the Orioles. Baltimore won that game 4-1. Now Keuchel is at his highest price of the year (-120) and that makes us instant sellers. Don’t get us wrong, Keuchel is good but he’s also been greatly aided by an 85% strand rate over his last seven starts. He’ll now face a Diamondbacks team that has quietly won six of their past eight games while scoring 55 times over that span.
In 13 starts, Brandon McCarthy is 1-8 with a 5.13 ERA. A crazy 22% hr/f against RH bats, the second-highest mark in MLB is the main cause of that misleading ERA and what makes that even crazier is that McCarthy has an elite groundball rate of 55%. One could safely call Brandon McCarthy the unluckiest pitcher in baseball but his skills scream out that ERA regression is 100% inevitable. In 79 innings, McCarthy has 72 K’s while issuing just 14 walks. That’s outstanding control with a strong K rate. He also has a groundball/fly-ball split of 55%/23% for one of the best GB/FB profiles in the game. McCarthy’s swinging strike rate of 12% supports his 72 strikeouts. McCarthy’s xERA on the year is 3.06 and his xERA over his past five starts is 2.82. You rarely see a pitcher with an xERA more than two runs higher or lower than his actual ERA but that’s the case with McCarthy. You are about to see significant improvement in McCarthy’s surface stats because his skills say so. This is a top-shelf pitcher at a second or third-tier price. Invest.
Atlanta @ COLORADO
Atlanta -1½ +121 over COLORADO
(Risking 2 units - To Win: 2.42)
It hasn't taken long for Julio Teheran to live up to his lofty prospect status. Teheran posted a 3.20 ERA in 2013 in his his first full MLB season and all he's done since then is post an elite 1.89 ERA and 0.93 WHIP through 13 starts in 2014. There is some ERA regression coming because he’s a fly-ball pitcher but his strikeout and walk ratios are in great shape and his swinging-strike rate of 13% hints there could be a K boost in the very near future. He’ll now face a Rockies team that has lost 14 of 16 and that is without Carlos Gonzalez, Michael Cuddyer, and Nolan Arenado.
The Rockies pitching staff is a complete mess. They have allowed 16, 12 and 13 runs against in three of their past six games and their pen has an ERA of 7.02 over the past 10 games. With injuries decimating its starters, Colorado has called up Tyler Matzek to make his major league debut. Matzek is a replacement starter for Eddie Butler, who was just recently called up and pitched one game before landing on the DL. Matzek is not major-league ready. He’s an emergency starter that will be heading back to the minors after this one start. He came into the year as the #13 prospect in the Rockies organization and has done nothing to improve that ranking. He is always fighting the strike zone and ends up walking too many batters. When a walk rate of 4.2/9 is the best of your career it becomes a big problem. At this park at this level, falling behind in the count and subsequently being forced into throwing fastballs is a big problem that Matzek will not overcome here. In 106 career minor league starts, Matzek has struck out 508 in 537.2 IP and walked 360, which contributed to a cumulative 1.58 WHIP at the minor league level. In 12 games at Colorado Springs this season, Matzek posted a 4.05 ERA, a .265 BAA and surrendered eight jacks in 66 innings. Looks like another long evening for the Rockies.
