Texas Rangers (51-41) AT Seattle Mariners (43-48)
July 14, 2011 at 10:10 PM EST
Opening Line: SEA -115, TEX -105
Current Line: SEA -118, TEX +111
Opening Total: 7
Current Total: 7
SP: TEX- Derek Holland, SEA- Jason Vargas
The Texas Rangers, after playing mediocre ball all year, have now won 6 straight games and will be sending Derek Holland to the mound tonight, as they seek to win their 16th of their last 23. Over the last 7 games before the all-star break, the Rangers hit .351 and averaged 7.6 runs per game.
Rangers’ manager Ron Washington is extremely pleased with the way his club has come on:
“We’ve finally got the type of baseball moving in the direction we’re capable of playing,” Washington beamed. “It was a while coming, but we finally got there. We know what we have to do and how we have to do it.”
The Rangers are now still dealing with the bizarre accident last Thursday, in which outfielder Josh Hamilton threw the ball up into the stands and Rangers fan Shannon Stone fell over the stands and died in an attempt to catch the ball for his son. For a game that has always prided itself on father-son moments, this one will certainly go down as a tragic irony of how cruel life can be at times.
Nonetheless, the Rangers have already paid their respects and Josh Hamilton doesn’t seem to be blaming himself for the incident. In Saturday’s win he had 4 hits and a walk off home run. Some people deal with mental adversities better than others, and Hamilton’s ability to not feel any guilt is remarkable, given the human propensity towards such in those situations.
The Rangers will send Derek Holland to the mound. Holland is 7-4 with a 4.68 ERA. He has lacked consistency and the Rangers are 9-9 in the games which he has started. In his last outing he pitched a four hitter, but in the game before that he gave up 12 runs, 8 of which were earned, in 6 2/3rds innings of work.
In his last outing against the Mariners, he gave up 3 runs innings of a 6-4 Rangers’ victory.
The Mariners, quite unlike the Rangers have not been experiencing as much success, as they lost their last 5 games going into the all-star break. In the four game sweep by the Angels, the Mariners managed only 9 runs, while their usually stellar pitching gave up 24 runs. The Mariners have one of the best pitching staffs in the league but their batters are hitting .224, last in the majors.
Eric Wedge realizes the importance of tonight’s contest. “We’ve got a lot of baseball left, but anytime you’re playing a team in your division ahead of you, it’s important,” Wedge said. “Coming out of the All-Star break, giving these guys some much-needed time off, I’d like to come out playing well.”
Jason Vargas has been one of the many successful Mariners’ pitchers, but a 3.49 ERA would usually net a better record than 6-6. He gave up only 2 runs in 8 innings against the A’s on Wednesday but received 0 runs of support.
Some betting trends:
The total has gone OVER in 7 of the Rangers’ last 10 games and the Rangers are 5-0 SU in their last 5 games. They are 4-2 SU in their last 6 on the road and the total has gone UNDER in 5 of the last 7 games on the road. The Rangers are 5-2 SU in their last 7 games against the Seattle Mariners and they are 2-4 SU in their last 6 road games against Seattle.
The total has gone UNDER in 8 of the Mariners’ last 10 games and they are 0-5 SU in their last 5 games. The Mariners are 2-4 SU in their last 6 games at home and the total has gone UNDER In 9 of their last 11 at home. The Mariners are 2-5 SU in their last 7 against the Rangers and they are 4-2 SU in their last 6 games at home against the Rangers.
As you can probably observe by the trends, the Mariners games have been going under most of the time. Handicappers just can’t seem to set the total low enough, and even a total of ‘7’ seems high. I like the ‘under’ almost every time for Mariners’ games.
