Let’s be honest. No one likes laying big prices in baseball. That’s why the run line is there. Myself, I will rarely ever play a number over -200. Sometimes however you look at all the information and the way it looks, the line should be even higher. That was the case as I started looking at the Orioles/Athletics match-up where I got the A’s at -190. Let’s be honest, it’s baseball so anything can happen and you’d think I’d be even more gun shy after the Orioles beat the Yankees on Sunday who were -200 favorites since I had money on the Yanks. I put this line at -230 though so I am getting some value here and let me tell you why.
First off, the pitchers taking the mound for the Orioles are night and day. Bruce Zimmerman who went yesterday is a 5th round pick who put up excellent numbers in AA and AAA, and is now starting to translate some of those successes over to the Majors. Spenser Watkins who goes tonight, is a 30th round pick who hasn’t had an xFIP below 5 since he was in AA in 2019. He had a full season K rate last year of 5.76 K/9. That’s not good. Baltimore’s bullpen leads the way in MLB currently with a 2.51 FIP, but the pedigree in that pen looks like the Westminster Kennel Club rejects, and they will start showing their true colors sooner rather than later. The O’s bullpen had a 5.71 ERA in 2021 and they traded arguably their best relieved Cole Sulser before the season. Regression fairies are about to show up for the O’s pen. You might say to me, that the price on the A’s is correct because the Yankees offense is much better and the lineup difference is why the worse pitcher is laying the same number. The Yankees are currently sitting at 25th in runs scored. The Athletics are 1st in MLB, scoring 23 more runs than the Yankees, and 32 more than this Orioles team. Are they getting lucky, the answer is yes a little bit as the OPS is in the bottom half of MLB. But they are also finding ways to manufacture runs and create some big innings. The Phillies, Rays and Blue Jays have been their opponents so far and they have touched up some top tier pitchers already early this season. Small sample size, but the leftovers in Oakland showing some pop.
The other starting pitcher is Athletics remaining ace Frankie Montas. Through a few starts he is striking out more than a batter an inning and walking less than one hitter per 9 innings. All things that will continue to benefit the Athletics, especially against this Orioles offense who has been awful so far. They lead the majors in strikeouts per game, whiffing 11.1 times per contest. They have struck out double digit times in 6 of the 9 games. So far they have only hit 4 Home runs through 9 games, and they are 27th in OPS raking at a less than robust .597. The wind should be blowing out tonight in Oakland, and Montas kept the ball on the ground 42.8% of the time in 2021. Spenser Watkins was at 33.5%. Montas is also really undervalued today in DFS if you play that, as he is currently only $7300 at Draftkings. He will be in all my lineups tonight for sure. I also trust Oakland’s bullpen to hold a lead here as well.
I am flat out laying the juice, and hitting the run line. This is almost a combined 3 Unit play for me. I think the F5 number having about the same odds is nice, but the -.5 runs isn’t nearly as good as the full game run line, which I got with a little +money to make it worthwhile. This isn’t an offense built to come back in the late innings.
Oakland -190, -1.42 Units to win .75 Units
Oakland -1.5 +110, 1.5 Units to win 1.65 Units
