Seattle @ L.A. ANGELS
L.A. ANGELS -1½ +159 over Seattle

BEST LINES:  Pinnacle -1½ +159 BET365 +1½ +155 SportsInteraction +1½ +155 5DIMES  +1½ +157

Posted at 12:45 PM EST.

9:05 PM EST. Jaime Barria (RHP) is 5-7, but his stock is at a season-low after recording a 0-6 record over his last seven starts. His last win came way back in June, but he has already pitched three times against the Mariners. The rookie is 0-3, but that winless stretch does not tell the whole story, as Barria allowed three runs or fewer in each one of those starts. Even if Barria doesn’t have his best stuff today, he teammates should be able to pick up the slack, as the Angels are scoring runs in bunches. L.A. was smoking out of the break with a .872 OPS in its latest homestand. The Halos have posted double-digit runs in two of their last three games and absolutely are at their best when smashing right-handed pitching. However, what most people see is Seattle’s great record, which makes the home side severely undervalued here. We’ll try and take advantage.

Felix Hernandez (RHP) has been featured in this space many times this season and we see no reason to let up as long as he continues to toe the slab. King Felix is a Mariners legend and he is paid that way, but his best days are way behind him. Hernandez is making his second start off the DL and does so against a red-hot Angels’ squad. Hernandez lost both of those starts and gave up four runs over five innings to the woeful White Sox last Saturday. However, the M’s aren’t going to pay him to come out of the pen (although they probably should) and as long as he can still sell a few tickets, he’s going to be run out there. You see, the Mariners made a demand this week for over $100-million in public funds. Billionaire owner begging for taxpayer dollars is nothing new, but this latest threat hits a little closer to home in Seattle, which already lost the Super Sonics under unscrupulous circumstances a decade ago. The Mariners have stated they refuse to sign a long-term lease without the public dough. While a move isn’t imminent, setting the wheels in motion for a move is a huge distraction that isn’t good for anybody involved. We also mentioned last week that Seattle is a prime fade target because of its extremely misleading record.

Only the Yankees, Red Sox and Astros have a better record than the Mariners. There is not a single team in the NL with a higher winning percentage than Seattle and in this world we live in, winning is everything. The market views the Mariners as one of the best teams in baseball because of their great record but it’s not legit.

You see, Boston’s run differential is +168. New York’s is +137. Houston’s run differential is +184. Those are the top three teams in the league. Seattle has the fourth best record in the league but its run differential is -1. That’s right, the Mariners have scored less runs than they’ve allowed, which does not correlate to a winning record. For instance, the Pirates run differential is exactly the same as Seattle’s and Pittsburgh is three games over .500 after winning 13 of their last 16 games. The Cardinals run differential is +14 and the Cards are a mere one game over .500. The Angels run differential is +33 and they’re one game over .500. One could go through the history books and never find a team with a run differential of -1 or thereabouts and be 19 games over .500 after 103 games. The conclusion is that the Mariners have been EXTREMELY lucky and with a starting staff that is among the worst in MLB, regression to that misleading record is almost guaranteed. The Seattle Mariners are no better than the Pirates, Rays, Cards or Blue Jays but they’re priced like they’re as good as the Yanks, Red Sox and Astros.

PLEASE NOTE: One of the unique things about our website is that we provide write-ups every single day on every game we post. We’re not sure if everyone understands how time consuming that is and how difficult it is as well but if you do not, please try it one day and you’ll see.

That said, we’re not going to change that. We’ll have write-ups every single day like we always do but we’re also going to have another feature. You see, we post our games usually in the early afternoon or before 1:00 PM EST but there is a lot of movement and other intangibles that occur throughout the day that has influence on what we’re betting. Usually after 6:00 PM EST or thereabouts, we’re going to be adding other games that we’re betting on in a section called “add-ons” for today that we ARE NOT going to write up because it’s too time consuming and with an hour or less before the first game goes off, we just won’t have the time.

This is a feature that you will see on our home page with the other wagers and we’ll also tweet it out when our add-ons have been posted.

Please note: We have leans posted daily on Twitter and you can follow us there for leans, possible late plays or any other info we might have to pass along. 

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Our Pick

L.A. ANGELS -1½ +159 (Risking 2 units - To Win: 3.18)

San Diego under 83½ -105
Boston under 79½ -110