MLB Baseball
2011-05-08 - Tampa Bay Rays at Baltimore Orioles
A Sports Betting Pick by Goober
Baseball: United States: MLB 2011
Sunday, May 8, 2011 - First Pitch 1:35 PM ET
The Tampa Bay Rays will go for a 3 game series sweep of the Baltimore Orioles in Baltimore on Sunday afternoon. These teams have played 5 times so far this season with the away team winning all 5.
Baltimore swept the Rays in the first 3 games of the season. Things have changed for both teams since then. The Rays started 1-8 on the season, but have been the best team in baseball since. They have 18 of their last 24 to get to 19-14 and tied with the New York Yankees for the AL East lead. The Rays are 10-4 away from home this season.
Baltimore on the other hand has fallen apart. After a 6-1 start some started to wonder if they could be a surprise team this year. But the Orioles have lost 17 of their last 25 games since then to fall to 14-18 and last place in the AL East. A big part of the problem is a 7-10 record at home.
The Rays are +25 in run differential for the season while the Orioles are -31. The Orioles offense is scoring less than 4 runs per game.
Wade Davis will start the game for the Rays. The right-hander is 3-2 on the season with an ERA of 2.77. Davis had a very rough start against Baltimore in his first appearance, giving up 4 runs in just over 6 innings. Davis has been very good since then, allowing no more than 2 runs in any of his next 5 starts and lasting at least 6 innings in all of them.
Davis has a good history against Baltimore as he is 3-2 with a 2.81 ERA in his career against them. So there is reason to believe he will get much better results this time around than he did at the beginning of the season.
The Rays have also been bolstered by the return of Evan Longoria to the lineup after an injury sustained early in the season.
The struggling Orioles will hand the ball to the struggling Brad Bergesen. He brings an 0-3 record with a 4.88 ERA into this game. The Orioles have lost every game he has appeared in.
Bergesen has struggled against most opponents so it is no surprise that he is 0-4 against Tampa Bay with an ERA of 9.00.
I look for Tampa Bay to stay hot and get another win here and sweep the Orioles. The price of 1.88 offered at Pinnacle is very good value.
The Pick :
Tampa Bay 4, Baltimore 2
BEST BETTING TIP :
Take the Tampa Bay Rays to win at 1.88 on Pinnacle.
