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Posted at 12:30 PM EST.

7:10 PM EST. Play the Reds if you like at +104 if you are on board but we’ll go for the kill with the more appealing ALTERNATE RUN LINE and take the small dog spotting 1½ runs because if they do win, there is a great chance it’ll be by more than a run at this extreme hitter’s park.

We’ll continue to preach that Colorado’s 19-13 road record is all smoke and mirrors and that a correction is coming. The Rocks are a weak hitting squad with skewed overall numbers because of the park they play in but on the road, Colorado ranks 19th in runs scored, 25th in total hits and 26th in OPS. That does not correlate to a winning road record. San Francisco (12-20 on the road) and Pittsburgh (13-15 on the road) for example, both have much better rankings than Colorado in every category. The Rocks are the same garbage road team that they’ve always been and it’s only a matter of time before that’s reflected in their record.  However, because it has a good record, Colorado is falsely priced as the chalk here against a better team with a worse record.

The Rocks lousy road offense will now face the forgotten Anthony DeSclafani. DeSclafani (RHP) missed all of  last season with elbow problems, though he never went under the knife and was supposed to be ready for spring. Last year we described him here as "still evolving." A year without throwing a pitch in anger doesn't move that process forward but man was this guy an intriguing prospect a couple of seasons ago when he went 9-5 for the Reds in 20 starts with 14 of those starts being of the pure quality variety. DeSclafani posted a skills supported 3.28 ERA in his last full duty as a starter. His couple of rehab starts this year do not look good on paper but we like that he still struck out 10 batters in 11 frames and was throwing 94 MPH heat with movement. DeSclafani is a bit of a wild card but the Rocks can make a lot of ordinary pitchers look good and DeSclafani might be better than ordinary. At this price, we’re willing to find out.

Aside from that, Kyle Freeland’s (LHP) strong ERA of 3.43 after 11 starts provides us with another opportunity to attack some misleading surface numbers. Freeland’s low ERA is the direct result of a fortunate strand rate of 83%. Once that inevitably normalizes, his surface ERA will shoot up. Freeland has a below average 9% swing and miss rate.  In 19 career road starts, he is 7-7 with a 4.42 ERA and 1.43 WHIP. He barely made the fifth starter out of spring and was even moved out of the rotation and into the pen last year. This rookie would have led his team in starts and IP last year had he not moved to the pen in the final weeks. This year, he’s mixed in a few more whiffs to mixed results, so he's still tinkering. The bigger issue is the absence of a quality third pitch and his average control. His most likely path to success is through mitigating HR damage, which is not exactly wagering catnip. Kyle Freeland is serviceable but he’s also extremely hittable and beatable and we’ll gladly put that to the test here.

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