MLB Baseball Betting for July 25, 2016
11 games on the Monday baseball betting board:
MLB BASEBALL BETTING FOR JULY 25, 2016:
PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES AT MIAMI MARLINS:
The Philadelphia Phillies looked to be showing some life right before the All Star Break but they’re back in the toilet having lost 7 of 10 including the last two games of their weekend series against the Pittsburgh Pirates. The biggest news out of their games against Pittsburgh was the Pirates hitting five Phillies’ batsmen in the first two game of the series. As these things usually go, Sunday’s finale was very quiet with no HBPs so even this story was much ado about nothing. Philadelphia third baseman Andres Blanco is likely headed to the DL with a broken finger (not caused by an errant Pirates’ pitch).
It’s really hard to think that the Phillies are going anywhere. They can avoid slipping into last place in the NL East by just ‘treading water’ as they’re 11.5 games up on the hapless Atlanta Braves (L8 of 10). On paper they’ve got a chance to get back into the NL East race. They’re 8.5 games back of the third place Mets and 9 games back of the second place Marlins but the Phillies have a great chance to pick up what should be some ‘easy wins’ this weekend as they play a four game series against the aforementioned hapless Braves at Turner Field in Atlanta. The Braves are the worst home team in baseball with a record of 14-36 -18.8 units.
Ironically, today’s starter for Philadelphia might be wearing a Marlins jersey before long. There is some debate among Phillies’ faithful over whether or not they should trade Jeremy Hellickson. The Marlins have already expressed their interest in the righthander should he be on the block. Hellickson has been capable this year but has looked very sharp of late. Overall, the Phillies have split his 20 starts this season including 8 on the road. He’s got a 3.84 ERA overall and a 1.162 WHIP. On the road he’s got a 4.10 ERA and a 1.200 WHIP. In his last three starts (two of which were Philadelphia wins) he’s put up a 2.70 ERA and a 0.900 WHIP with 16 strikeouts to just 2 walks. That’s some solid work. Then again, it could be that Hellickson is bearing down as an ‘audition’ to get out of town.
Miami will counter with right hander Jarred Cosart who is back up at the Major League level after a rough start to the year followed by a stint on the DL and a trip to the minors. He hasn’t pitched in the bigs since 4/22 and his numbers in his three starts of the season aren’t worth mentioning.
Philadelphia has been very competitive with the Marlins this season splitting 10 meetings overall and winning 2 of 3 in Florida. We’ll take them at the price here.
BET PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES +120 OVER MIAMI MARLINS
ST. LOUIS CARDINALS AT NEW YORK METS:
The Mets took 2 of 3 from the Marlins over the weekend and have cut Miami’s advantage over them to 1/2 game. New York is currently in third place 5 games back of the division leading Washington Nationals. Not an easy draw here as the Cardinals have been playing excellent baseball of late winning 7 of 10 (pending the outcome of Sunday night’s game) and cutting the Chicago Cubs’ lead atop the NL Central to 7 games. Of course the ‘glass half empty’ view is that even though the Cubs struggled badly immediately before the All Star break the Cardinals have not been able to get closer than 6.5 games. They’ve got a 1.5 game lead over the Pittsburgh Pirates in third place so they’ve got some pressure from below.
The Mets are 5-5 in their last 10 and are a huge question mark. They’ve got solid pitching but their offense is horrible. They’ve got the #29 ranked runs output in baseball leading only the bottom feeding Atlanta Braves. They’ve got the #27 team batting average. Today’s pitching matchup is a good one–St. Louis will send Carlos Martinez against New York’s Noah Syndergaard. That means that the pitching is a ‘wash’ between these teams meaning that the Cardinals have the substantially better offense. St. Louis averages 5.1 runs per game against right handers to the Mets 3.8 runs per game. The Cards average 6.0 runs per game on the raod to the Mets 3.8 runs per game at home. St. Louis also has a 22 point higher team batting average against right handers and their road batting average is 35 points higher than the Mets’ home batting average. Just can’t see laying a price with the Mets against a solid Cardinals’ team with a substantially better offense.
BET ST. LOUIS CARDINALS +130 OVER NEW YORK METS