Here is one, courtesy of Sherwood who posts here every now and then.
L.A. Angels @ ARIZONA L.A. Angels +178 over ARIZONA BEST LINES: Pinnacle+178 BET365 +170SportsInteraction +1705DIMES +172Posted at 10:45 AM EST.[FONT=arial !important]9:40 PM EST. The pitching matchup here on paper looks like a big mismatch in the Diamondbacks favor and while it may turn out to be, the truth is that’s it’s not a mismatch at all. That brings us to all the “luck driven” stats we discuss often in this space with the suspects being Arizona’s Clay Buchholz (RHP) and the Angels Odrisamer Despaigne (RHP). Comparing the two, Buchholz has an unsustainable 85% strand rate this year while Despaigne’s strand rate is 48%. Of the 30 pitchers starting today, Despaigne’s strand rate ranks 30th while Buchholz’s ranks second. [FONT=arial !important]The next luck driven number is Batting Average on Balls in Play (BABIP), where Buchholz has posted a .258 BABIP while Depaigne has posted a .359 BABIP. Again, Despaigne’s BABIP ranks dead last in MLB while Buchholz’s BABIP is the 7th most fortunate of today’s 30 starters. Next up is ERA v xERA, where Clay Buchholz has a ERA/xERA split of 2.47/4.27. Odrisamer Despaigne’s ERA/xERA split is 6.29/4.14. This is a tale of a starting pitcher for the Halos with a small sample size of horrible luck over just 24 innings. However, Despaigne has a 13% swing and miss rate and 21 K’s in 24 frames so he’s missing bats and he’s no stranger to starting or pitching at this level with 335 career innings. Don’t get us wrong, as Despaigne is not some hot-shot prospect with a great pedigree or promise but he’s comparable to Clay Buchholz any day of the week. Buchholz has not been relevant since 2015 and when he last pitched a full season, his skills were unrosterable. He’s been better this year but also much luckier, as he throws 89 MPH, he has a weak 41% groundball rate and his swing and miss rate last game was 5%. Clay Buchholz went the complete game route and made a season-high 112 pitches in that last start. Boy, does that make him vulnerable here against an Angels’ squad that hits righties well and that owns a .795 OPS over the last two weeks. Clay Buchholz cannot be priced in this range against an offense that can go off at any time.[/FONT][/FONT]
