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Can the Phillies Solve Sean Manaea?
By Joe Tansey
Published:
Sean Manaea’s been one of the hardest pitchers for the Phillies to solve since the start of last year.
The Mets won the last three Manaea starts against the Phils, including Game 3 of the 2024 NLCS and on August 26th as part of the Mets’ sweep at Citi Field.
Manaea did allow two earned runs on six hits in the August outing, but he also stuck out eight and shut down the Phillies order for the first four innings.
A year ago, Manaea had two seven-inning outings against the Phils and another that lasted six frames. The lone exception in the recent trend is a bad outing from the Mets southpaw on June 8th of last year, in which he was chased in the fourth inning.
With all that in mind, the Phillies are the -130 favorite at ESPN Bet with Ranger Suarez on the mound.
Suarez is coming off six shutout innings against the Brewers, which was another step in the right direction. Three starts ago, Suarez tossed seven shutout frames versus the Nationals. The Over 17.5 for Suarez’s outs recorded prop sits at -190, but the juice could be worth the squeeze based on his recent form.
There are two distinct trends in play regarding the Over/Under of 8.5.
Five of Suarez’s last six starts have had fewer than seven runs. The last three of those contests featured five runs or fewer.
On the other side, each of Manaea’s last six appearances have been in games in which at least 10 runs were scored. He’s allowed 24 earned runs in that span, which makes it more baffling that the Phils weren’t able to get more off him at Citi Field.
Manaea owns a 6.53 ERA away from home, so you would think the high-scoring trend, at least for the Phillies, would continue even with Trea Turner and Alec Bohm, two of the team’s better hitters against lefties, out of the lineup.
Honestly, it might be a night for the unsung heroes.
Edmundo Sosa has a .320 batting average against lefties. Harrison Bader is 7-for-20 in his last six games and he’s got a pair of three-hit games already in September.
At NJ and PA sports betting apps, I would advise taking each player to get a hit as straights. Bader is -175 and Sosa is -155 at ESPN Bet. I would combine the two in a SGP that puts you at +148.
I’d also take a sprinkle on either player to go yard. Manaea’s allowed six home runs since August 1. Bader is +525 to go yard, while Sosa is +800.
Joe Tansey writes sports betting posts for Crossing Broad and also covers the Philadelphia Union for his Substack site, Union Soccer Blog.