Pure Profets Play Of The Day: July 23 - How to lower odds to make a MLB game playable

Thursday, July 23, 2009

July 23 - How to lower odds to make a MLB game playable

Don't you hate it when you are handicapping and find a team that you believe will win easily, but then you look at the money line and it is at a ridiculous number where you will be risking a good chunk of money just to win your usual amount? This happens a lot in MLB baseball after the All Star break. Bookmakers know that bettors will bet heavily on the good teams no matter what the cost. Here we very rarely lay over -150. So how do you get around this? Run lines! If you feel confident that a team will win big, you can bet that they will win by 2 runs and lower the odds dramatically.

San Diego Padres @ Philadelphia Phillies

The Philadelphia Phillies' longest winning streak in 18 years may be over, but the 10-game run was enough to give them a nice cushion atop the NL East. Philadelphia (53-39) will try to shake off its first loss in more than two weeks Thursday night when it welcomes in the last-place Padres for the makeup of an April rainout. A game against the Padres is a good way to get another winning streak started.

The fighting Phillies have averaged 5.7 runs during the streak while allowing just 2.6 runs to their opponents. Holding the Padres (37-58) off the scoreboard hasn't been a challenge for anyone lately. San Diego has scored more than three runs just once in its last 13 games, and Wednesday was shut out for the ninth time.

Cole Hamels (5-5, 4.72 ERA) will get the start Thursday for Philadelphia. Hamels is not having as successful a year as last year but has been pretty good as of late. The left-hander gave up one run and four hits over five innings in a rain-shortened outing Friday at Florida.

Kevin Correia (6-7, 4.34) will get the ball for San Diego. He is actually one of their better pitchers but has not had much success against the Phillies giving up four runs and 10 hits over 4 1/3 innings - including homers to Howard and Chase Utley - in a 5-3 loss to the Phillies back on June 1.

Here are some Pure Profets trends to sway your decision:

-Padres are 15-36 in their last 51 overall.

-Padres are 1-5 in their last 6 when their opponent scores 5 runs or more in their previous game.

-Padres are 0-7 in their last 7 vs. National League East.

-Phillies are 11-1 in their last 12 games as a home favorite.
-Phillies are 7-1 in their last 8 games vs. a right-handed starter.

-Phillies are 23-5 in Hamels' last 28 starts vs. a team with a losing record.

-Padres are 0-4 in the last 4 meetings.

With all this going for them we feel very confident that the Phillies will win and win big. The straight money line on the game is Phillies -275, but if we give up 1 1/2 runs we can get the line down to Phillies -120. That gets us some good value on the Phillies.