Happy Wednesday everyone. We’re almost through the first month of MLB Baseball and we’ve righted the ship after a rough first two weeks. 29-32-1 Overall -4.38 Units on the season, but 18-11-1 the last two weeks + 9.31 Units. I expect the recent trend to continue tonight as I have four plays on the card including this free selection. You can find all my plays here @TheOddsbreakers.com
My Analysis today turns to Angel Stadium in Anaheim where the Angels will host the Baltimore Orioles at 4:07 ET. The current line sits at Baltimore -131/ Los Angeles +111 with an Over/Under of 9.5 juiced to the over at -115. Game time temperature will be 66 degrees under clear skies with the wind blowing out to center at around 10mph.
Tyler Anderson will take the hill for the Angels and he is having a great start to the season boasting a 1.42 ERA. That is deceiving however as he has been very lucky so far and his underlying metrics tell a different story. His K/9 sits at 4.97 and his walk rate per nine innings is at 3.2. Add in a 96% LOB percentage and an opponent BABIP of .167 and you’ve got the Regression Fairies waiting to sprinkle some magic blowup dust on his ERA. The xFIP is 5.17 so this seems like as good of a spot as any for someone to come in and pound him. That someone is the Orioles lineup which is one of the best in baseball coming in at second in MLB with an OPS of .775 and they match that number versus left handed pitching. Their bats are stronger from the left hand side, but the overall splits still look good across the board for the Orioles so I anticipate them being able to get to Anderson.
Dean Kremer is on the hill for the Orioles. He has not pitched awful with the exception of one bad outing against the Brewers really blowing up his ratios. He has been prone to the longball giving up 2.05 HR/9 here early in the season. The overall ERA sits at 4.91 with an xFIP at 4.34. The Angels offense has an OPS of .687, and .679 versus right handed pitching. Mike Trout and Taylor Ward are hitting well to begin the season combining for 15 Home Runs, but the rest of the team has only combined for 9 total homers.
With the wind blowing out it is possible both pitchers give up some long balls. Anderson has a fly ball rate at over 50% currently and with the pop in this Orioles lineup and the breeze blowing out it could be an early shower. Kremer isn’t much better showing with a 45.8% fly ball rate. If the game gets tight later the bullpen has been better for the Orioles who sport a half run better bullpen ERA, more strikeouts and less walks from the pen. For me this comes down to the team with the better offense, and I think the Orioles pull away and win this game.
Take Baltimore -131 for 1 Unit, or if you want some plus money on it split a half unit each on the ML and RL
