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Phillies an Overwhelming Favorite for Home Series with Athletics
By Joe Tansey
Published:
It doesn’t get easier than this for the Philadelphia Phillies to close out the first half of the Major League Baseball season, at least on paper.
The Phillies are an overwhelming series favorite to beat the Oakland Athletics this weekend at Citizens Bank Park.
You can’t blame the odds makers for setting astronomical prices in favor of the Phillies for the series and each game, starting as a -278 favorite behind Ranger Suarez on Friday. They’re up to -290 at some books.
Suarez is in the perfect spot to bounce back from his pair of tough outings against the Atlanta Braves and Miami Marlins. He allowed 11 earned runs on 16 hits in those two starts.
The good news for Ranger and the rest of the Phillies pitching staff is that the A’s do not bring much to the table on offense.
There are some nice pieces for the future in Miguel Andujar and J.J. Bleday, but the most important part of their order this weekend will be Brent Rooker, who may be doing an in-person audition for the Phillies.
Rooker is one of the top corner outfielders on the trade market and he could be a bargain buy by the Phillies front office if the trade prices attached to Luis Robert Jr. or others are too high.
There are 23 places and 1.2 points separating the Phillies and A’s on the team ERA chart. Oakland has the fifth-worst team ERA on the road. They’re coming off a series in which they allowed 21 runs to the Boston Red Sox.
Oakland allowed at least five runs in six of the last nine road games and there’s no relief in sight with some average-at-best arms headed to the mound.
Friday’s starter, Hogan Harris, gave up 10 hits in his last road start in Arizona. He gave up 31 hits and 14 earned runs since June 1st.
Mitch Spence, who starts Saturday, gave up 10 earned runs in his last two road appearances. Sunday’s scheduled starter, Joey Estes, owns a god awful 9.10 road ERA.
I would look to the red-hot Trea Turner for any type of player props with sportsbook apps in PA. There isn’t much past history to draw on in the pitching matchups, so I would just ride the top Phillies bats.
The Phillies do not have a starter lined up for Sunday yet, but Saturday brings about a fascinating start for Tyler Phillips, who marveled in his relief outing last Sunday in Atlanta.
The South Jersey product struck out seven batters in four innings in that game. He has the potential to strike out a ton of As batters with the adrenaline pumping in front of his home crowd.
I’ll be fascinated to see what Phillips’ strikeout prop will be, but if it’s anything 5.5 or lower, I would hammer the over because of his stuff and the poor Oakland lineup. Old friend Nick Pivetta fanned 10 Oakland batters earlier this week.
The series price is understandably hefty on New Jersey sports betting apps, so that’s probably not worth betting, but there will be some fun angles throughout the weekend, like with Phillips, to bet on. And if those lines aren’t doing anything for you, there’s PA online casino and NJ online casino. BetMGM features an MLB-themed slots game designed specifically for baseball fans to enjoy.
Joe Tansey writes sports betting posts for Crossing Broad and also covers the Philadelphia Union for his Substack site, Union Soccer Blog.