{"id":16505,"date":"2011-07-19T01:09:06","date_gmt":"2011-07-19T06:09:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=16505"},"modified":"2011-07-19T01:09:06","modified_gmt":"2011-07-19T06:09:06","slug":"al-betting-preview-seattle-mariners-open-three-game-home-set-against-toronto-blue-jays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/al-betting-preview-seattle-mariners-open-three-game-home-set-against-toronto-blue-jays-16505\/","title":{"rendered":"AL Betting Preview: Seattle Mariners Open Three Game Home Set Against Toronto Blue Jays"},"content":{"rendered":"

Seattle Mariners (43-52) AT Toronto Blue Jays (47-49)<\/strong>
\nJuly 19, 2011 at 7:05 PM EST<\/strong>
\nOpening Line:\u00a0 EVEN<\/strong>
\nCurrent Line:\u00a0 EVEN<\/strong>
\nOpening Total: 8<\/strong>
\nCurrent Total: 7.5<\/strong><\/p>\n

SP:\u00a0 SEA- Michael Pi\u00f1eda, TOR:\u00a0 Brett Cecil<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Pi\u00f1eda looks to be a future ace for many years to come<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For a team like the Blue Jays, who are still in the hunt, but needing a win streak to get them into contention for a wild card slot, will get just the help they need tonight, as Jose Bautista is set to return.\u00a0 Bautista leads the league in home runs with 31, but missed the last three games with a bum ankle.\u00a0 He took some swings before Sunday’s match against the Yankeese and should be returning tonight, if all has gone according to schedule.<\/p>\n

The Blue Jays defeated the Yankees 7-1 on Friday night without Bautista, but lost the last two games of the series by producing only 3 runs between the two games.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis absence in the lineup is a hole to fill,\u201d Blue Jays’ manager John Farrell said. \u201cHe\u2019s our leader, he\u2019s our most productive offensive player. That\u2019s a substantial loss when he\u2019s not in there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bautista has an 11 game hitting streak going against the Mariners, in which he is batting .375 and has dialed up 4 HRs and 10 RBIs.\u00a0 The Blue Jays have won 5 of the last 6 matchups against the Mariners at home.<\/p>\n

Seattle has been going UNDER the total almost every night, as they are hitting only .221 from the plate while averaging just over three runs a game (3.19).\u00a0\u00a0 It is the worst batting average since 1972, when the Rangers lost 100 games with a .217 average.\u00a0 The Mariners have been able to do much better than that Rangers team, due to pitching, but it’s never fun to break a 40 year streak of greatest futility.<\/p>\n

Over their last 9 games, all losses, they have scored only 11 runs while hitting .179.\u00a0 They have only hit two homers in 14 games this month.\u00a0 Even Ichiro isn’t impressing, hitting .114 in his last 9 games and .262 on the season.\u00a0 This could be the first season ever in which the 5’11” Japanese outfielder does not hit over .300.<\/p>\n

The 9 game losing streak the Mariners are riding is their worst since September of 2008 and it has caused them to fall 11.5 games behind the AL-leading Rangers.\u00a0 They had cut the lead to 2.5 gaems as of July 5th, but Mariners’ manager Eric Wedge acknowledges that it’s been “a tough stretch,” though he did admit it was “a tough pill to swallow” to see his club fade from contention so quickly and tragically.<\/p>\n

Michael Pi\u00f1eda gave up 7 runs and 6 hits in 5 innings in his last outing, a 9-3 loss to the Angels on the 5th of July.\u00a0 Pi\u00f1eda is 8-6 on the year with a 3.03 ERA, but he hasn’t recorded a quality start since his June 23rd shutout against the Nationals.\u00a0 His WHIP is nearly 1-flat, and hitters are only batting .198 against him.\u00a0 He’s struck out over 3 times as many as he has walked and has only given up 10 home runs in 113 innings pitched.<\/p>\n

The Blue Jays will send Brett Cecil to the mound.\u00a0 Cecil is 2-4 with a 5.66 ERA and he entered the all star break as a winner against the Indians, in which he gave up only 1 run in 6 innings.\u00a0 It was his first win since he spent 2 months in the minors.\u00a0 On May 19th, 2010, he held the Seattle Mariners to 2 runs in 6 1\/3rds innings of a 3-2 Blue Jays’ win.\u00a0 Brett Cecil experienced good success last year, due to great run support.\u00a0 His 15-7 record was tempered by a 4.22 ERA, though that was his best ERA since his 2008 run at the Double-A affiliate.<\/p>\n

Again, as advocated, another moneyline bet on the opposition and an ‘under’ has worked with the Mariners, as they have dropped their last 9 games and they have scored only 4 runs in their last 5 games, after a 26 inning scoreless stretch.\u00a0 So, once again, I strongly advocate a moneyline bet on the Blue Jays, parlayed with the ‘under.’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Seattle Mariners (43-52) AT Toronto Blue Jays (47-49) July 19, 2011 at 7:05 PM EST Opening Line:\u00a0 EVEN Current Line:\u00a0 EVEN Opening Total: 8 Current Total: 7.5 SP:\u00a0 SEA- Michael Pi\u00f1eda, TOR:\u00a0 Brett Cecil For a team like the Blue Jays, who are still in the hunt, but needing a win streak to get them […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40250,"featured_media":15584,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[220,223],"class_list":["post-16505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-seattle-mariners","tag-toronto-blue-jays"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16505","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\/40250"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16505"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16505\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16507,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16505\/revisions\/16507"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}