One day game and 14 night games are on the betting board for Tuesday, as we’ll see all 30 teams in action and have some pretty interesting games to handicap. There are good pitching matchups, bad pitching matchups and some in between, but today is another one of those days where you want to see how long it has been since a guy took the mound in real game conditions.
Side sessions and bullpens just don’t have the same intensity as going out there against another team, so you want to think about that and factor it into your handicapping on a case-by-case basis.
Marlins/Reds: Miami lived up to its billing of being bad against lefties and Nick Lodolo took advantage as the Reds rolled to an 11-2 win. Lodolo gave up two unearned runs over six and struck out nine, while the Cincinnati offense rolled up six runs on eight hits in 3.2 innings against Trevor Rogers and blasted reliever Zach Pop for four runs in just 0.2 innings.
Since getting recalled from the minors on July 5, Lodolo has allowed 10 runs on 22 hits in 17.2 innings with a 28/9 K/BB ratio. He looks like a solid arm coming from a Cincinnati organization that has really improved its minor league pitching over the last 3-4 seasons.
Braves/Phillies: Baseball is a funny game, eh? After getting swept by the Cubs, the Phillies won a game started by Max Fried with a 6-4 victory over the Braves. Fried gave up three runs on nine hits, but it was the three runs allowed by AJ Minter in the eighth that made the difference. Bryson Stott, who isn’t even hitting his weight, had the big blow and drove in five of the six runs. Yeah, baseball is a really weird game.
Pirates/Cubs: It’s a good thing I didn’t fade Adrian Sampson despite my clear reservations about what the veteran right-hander is doing. He went seven strong innings with two runs on six hits and only allowed six hard-hit balls, despite having just three strikeouts. As I said yesterday, I don’t think he can keep this up, but I guess we’ll see. The Cubs have won five in a row on the heels of a nine-game losing streak right before the Break.
Rockies/Brewers: A huge underdog cash from the article yesterday with Colorado’s 2-0 win over Milwaukee at + 170 may have been a fortunate win. Aaron Ashby had 17 whiffs on 52 swings and absolutely pounded the strike zone with 28 called strikes. He did, however, also allow a lot of hard contact and two runs on five hits. He only walked one, though, so this was about as good as it gets for him.