{"id":14813,"date":"2011-04-11T08:08:34","date_gmt":"2011-04-11T13:08:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=14813"},"modified":"2011-04-11T08:08:34","modified_gmt":"2011-04-11T13:08:34","slug":"texas-rangers-at-detroit-tigers-free-mlb-picks-and-predictions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/texas-rangers-at-detroit-tigers-free-mlb-picks-and-predictions-14813\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas Rangers at Detroit Tigers Free MLB Picks and Predictions"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Texas Rangers have won two straight and eight of their first nine games heading into a three-game set against the Detroit Tigers at Comerica Park<\/p>\n

Texas Rangers at Detroit Tigers<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
The Detroit Tigers offense has been strong early in the year due to the exploits of star Miguel Cabrera<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Texas leads the majors with eight wins at this point of the season and its 8-1 record matches the best in club history through nine games.\u00a0 The Rangers joined the 1989 team, which won 10 of its first 11, as the only ones in franchise history to start 8-1.\u00a0 \u201cWe can play whatever the games asks us to play.\u00a0 That\u2019s what we play,\u201d said manager Ron Washington.\u00a0 \u201cWe do have guys up and down the lineup that can punch the ball out of the ball park.\u201d\u00a0 With the upcoming all-day games series in the Motor City, it\u2019s worth noting that Texas is 4-0 in day contests in 2011.\u00a0 The club is 129-101 versus right-handers the last three years.<\/p>\n

Rangers starting pitcher Alexi Ogando is set to make his second major league start in the opener of this three-game series in Detroit.\u00a0 The 27-year-old right-hander will be making his first-ever start on the road, as he was 2-1 with a 1.93 ERA in 19 relief appearances on the road last season.\u00a0 Ogando has no record and a 3.86 ERA in three career relief appearances against the Tigers.\u00a0 In his only outing at today\u2019s venue, he allowed one run in 1.1 innings in a Rangers\u2019 8-6 14-inning win.\u00a0 The second-year hurler tossed six scoreless frames against Seattle in his season debut.<\/p>\n

Detroit lost for the third time in four games Sunday and committed a season-high four errors in a 9-5 loss to Kansas City.\u00a0 The Tigers are going in an opposite direction of today\u2019s opponent and are off to their worst nine-game start since beginning 1-8 in 2008.\u00a0 \u201cI don\u2019t mind physical errors, but teams are going to take advantage of them,\u201d said manager Jim Leyland.\u00a0 The team as a whole is struggling to find itself, but start player Miguel Cabrera is off to a strong start, batting .355 with four home runs and nine RBIs through the first nine games.\u00a0 Detroit is 104-61 at home the past three seasons.<\/p>\n

Tigers starting pitcher Justin Verlander is 1-0 with a 3.86 ERA through two starts this season and will be making his 2011 home debut Monday.\u00a0 The right-hander garnered his first win of the season last time out in a 7-3 road victory over the Orioles, allowing three runs and four hits over eight strong innings.\u00a0 In his last six starts against Texas, Verlander is 5-0 with a 1.66 ERA.\u00a0 He\u2019s only allowed seven earned runs in 38 innings while striking out 45 during that span.\u00a0 Verlander has posted solid numbers when pitching during the day, going 34-12 with a 3.32 ERA in 60 starts.<\/p>\n

Bettors are likely to back the Tigers due to their 42-17 record in Verlander\u2019s last 59 home starts, while the Rangers are 3-13 in the last 16 meetings in Detroit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Texas Rangers have won two straight and eight of their first nine games heading into a three-game set against the Detroit Tigers at Comerica Park Texas Rangers at Detroit Tigers Texas leads the majors with eight wins at this point of the season and its 8-1 record matches the best in club history through […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":4965,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[4840,2126,48,104,2010,771],"class_list":["post-14813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-alexi-ogando","tag-comerica-park","tag-detroit-tigers","tag-justin-verlander","tag-miguel-cabrera","tag-texas-rangers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14813"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14813\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14815,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14813\/revisions\/14815"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4965"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}