Jake's Picks - MLB April 14th (plus a video of stupid people doing stupid stuff)

JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

Record: 23-22 -.41 Units
2 Unit Plays: 2-0

Somewhere I screwed up my record it appears. Since all my plays are for one-unit with the exception of the two 2-unit plays which both won, you would assume a winning record would net a positive number on the units won/loss tally, but for some reason it doesn't. I either screwed up on the W/L or on calculating my winnings, but I'm not too concerned at this point because I'm close to even no matter what the correct numbers should be. If anyone is wondering how I managed those numbers without ever playing big favorites, your guess is as good as mine.

On to the card at hand...

Oh wait, first the video...

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JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

My NL Lines:

LAD -165, U8.5 -112
Zona -130, O9 -120

My NL Bets:

San Francisco/Arizona Over 8 +100
Pitchers: Sanchez/RJ

Sanchez is not ML ready and Arizona has hit lefties very well this season. Sanchez struggled alot with Arizona last season and I don't see why anything would be different this time around. SF is obviously having problems hitting but Randy Johnson has only been average in his minor league rehab starts and has always given up runs in them. He's also had a poor history while pitching in San Francisco in the past and although it doesn't really matter since the lineups have changed, it's possible the park just isn't meant for him. Neither team has a bullpen that impresses me at all.

JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

My AL Lines:

Tor -130, U9 -112
Cle -120, U9 -115
Det -155, U9 -113
Yankees -170, 9.5 Pk
LAA -115, O11.5 -112
ChW -130, U8 -120
Sea -125, U8 -120

My AL Bets:

Toronto/Baltimore Under 9.5 +100
Pitchers: McGowan/Albers

Albers scares me a little here since he's only had limited success at the major league level but the Blue Jays aren't hitting that well and Albers looked like he's taken a step forward in the spring. The Orioles are cooling off offensively and McGowan is a stud. He has started out a little iffy with his command but he still has what it takes to possibly blank Baltimore here. Gotta like the under and we'll just hope Albers comes to perform.

New York Yankees -125
Pitchers: Kennedy/Sonnanstine

Kennedy's last start shouldn't be held against him since there was a ton of question marks going into the game about whether Kennedy would even go. He was told to sit down and then the game started and the delay never happened so it's hard to hold that against him. He is a pitcher who should have a very nice year and the DRays aren't hitting and had trouble with him last year. Sonnanstine is a guy who really should be pitching better than he is but at the same time, he's not going to have a ton of success against the Yankees no matter what. NYY should put up some early runs and never look back.

LAA/Texas Over 10.5 -115
Pitchers: Santana/Jennings

Santana gets rocked hard every time he comes to Texas. The ballpark is too small for him and he always gives up a load of runs. Jennings is another guy who can't pitch well in this stadium and the Angels should score on him early and often. There will be a ton of home runs in this game and the sky is the limit as both teams have shots at getting into double digit runs.

Oakland Athletics +135
Oakland/CHW Under 9 +100
2 Unit Play on the Under
Pitchers: Smith/Buehrle

Greg Smith is somewhat unproven but was very sharp in the spring and had no problems in his first major league start. The White Sox don't hit lefties well at all and having never seen Smith before, they will likely struggle. Oakland doesn't hit lefties any better than Buehrle should have a nice start here as well. Look for both guys to go fairly deep into this one and I don't see either team scoring more than a run or two off the starters, and even that may not happen.

smartz · Apr 14, 2008

I wouldnt say no problems in his 1st MLB start. He had 5 BB's. And the whitesox lineup is full of right handed bats who have all hit lefties better throughout their career.

JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

smartz said:
I wouldnt say no problems in his 1st MLB start. He had 5 BB's. And the whitesox lineup is full of right handed bats who have all hit lefties better throughout their career.

?

They are hitting .231 this season against lefties. Konerko and Dye are the only ones who can touch lefties in that lineup. Swisher is average at best. Thome struggles. It's Konerko and Dye and no one else pretty much.

PS, Smith did issue more walks than I'd like to see but at the same time, he went into a hitters' park against a very good Blue Jay offense and only allowed 2 hits over 6 innings.

Also, most of those stats for that game were done in the first inning when Smith admitted to being extremely nervous. It was his first ever major league start so I don't think I can really hold that against him. All the runs he allowed as well as 2 of those walks came in the first frame. After that, he was dominant.

I think he'll have a very nice game. GL to ya smartz.

smartz · Apr 14, 2008

jakethompson said:
?

They are hitting .231 this season against lefties. Konerko and Dye are the only ones who can touch lefties in that lineup. Swisher is average at best. Thome struggles. It's Konerko and Dye and no one else pretty much.

PS, Smith did issue more walks than I'd like to see but at the same time, he went into a hitters' park against a very good Blue Jay offense and only allowed 2 hits over 6 innings.

Also, most of those stats for that game were done in the first inning when Smith admitted to being extremely nervous. It was his first ever major league start so I don't think I can really hold that against him. All the runs he allowed as well as 2 of those walks came in the first frame. After that, he was dominant.

I think he'll have a very nice game. GL to ya smartz.

Its been 2 weeks into the season. How can you hold those stats higher than career averages. Konerko, Dye, Cabrera, Crede, Uribe, Swisher. all hit for a higher average against lefties. The only guys who dont are the left handed bats of Thome and Pierzynski.
And you have no idea how he would have performed if it wasn't his first start. There is no clear correlation between pitchers performing poorly their 1st time out as compared to starts after that. Otherwise everyone would fade rookies their 1st time out.

JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

skiz420 said:
such a random video....
im with ya on the san fran/zona over and laa/tex over... might parlay them tomorow

Haha well since my picks weren't doing as well as I had planned so far, I figured I'd throw in a YouTube video here and there to make up for lack of quality selections. So if the picks tank, at least anyone that checked out the thread got a video to watch. That's my theory anyway.

Good luck to us on those overs. I think both will hit. :toast:

JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

smartz said:
Its been 2 weeks into the season. How can you hold those stats higher than career averages. Konerko, Dye, Cabrera, Crede, Uribe, Swisher. all hit for a higher average against lefties. The only guys who dont are the left handed bats of Thome and Pierzynski.
And you have no idea how he would have performed if it wasn't his first start. There is no clear correlation between pitchers performing poorly their 1st time out as compared to starts after that. Otherwise everyone would fade rookies their 1st time out.

Never said I was holding those stats higher than career averages. Just said they haven't hit lefties this year at all and other than Konerko and Dye, no one on that team has hit lefties well the last year plus. If they hit higher against lefties than righties that's fine. I never said they didn't. What I said was that as a whole, the White Sox do not hit lefties well and that is true.

PS, if Smith said nerves got the better of him, I'll trust the guy. He was on the mound and would know best. His story seems to check out since after he stumbled with his first few pitches, he dominated. Maybe he's full of crap and coming up with an excuse as to why he was so shaky during that first frame of his major league career, I don't know, but I'll take his word for it.

smartz · Apr 14, 2008

The White Sox don't hit lefties well at all

As a whole? 7/9 hitters hit lefties better. Do Thome and Pierzynski take 20 more ABs than the other guys.

smartz · Apr 14, 2008

Im not trying to say your pick is wrong or anything, just your reasoning seems false.

JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

smartz said:
The White Sox don't hit lefties well at all

As a whole? 7/9 hitters hit lefties better. Do Thome and Pierzynski take 20 more ABs than the other guys.

They hit .242 as a team last year. .231 this year.

Sorry if this sounds rude, but the fact they hit lefties better than righties has nothing at all to do with this argument. The fact of the matter is they don't hit lefties well.

If I say I hate burgers from Burger King and you say, well, McDonalds is even worse... that doesn't mean that Burger King isn't still bad. If that makes sense.

Also, just to add to the argument...

The lefty starters they have gone up against so far...

Nate Robertson (7.84 ERA)
Dontrelle Willis (7.20 ERA)

And despite those huge ERAs, both guys had success against CHW.

JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

smartz said:
Im not trying to say your pick is wrong or anything, just your reasoning seems false.

Nah it's cool I don't take offense to it. The more discussion about this the more everyone knows and learns and hopefully that should translate into more money won for the board.

I get what you are saying... I am just in an arguing type of mood right now. It's late and I'm cranky. Don't take any offense to anything. :toast:

smartz · Apr 14, 2008

jakethompson said:
They hit .242 as a team last year. .231 this year.

Sorry if this sounds rude, but the fact they hit lefties better than righties has nothing at all to do with this argument. The fact of the matter is they don't hit lefties well.

If I say I hate burgers from Burger King and you say, well, McDonalds is even worse... that doesn't mean that Burger King isn't still bad. If that makes sense.

Also, just to add to the argument...

The lefty starters they have gone up against so far...

Nate Robertson (7.84 ERA)
Dontrelle Willis (7.20 ERA)

And despite those huge ERAs, both guys had success against CHW.

They hit .246 as a team lefties and righties combined. And if they dont hit either well them not hitting lefties well is not of great significance. When you say they dont hit lefties well by deducing whats available its in comparison to how they hit righties. Unless there are pitchers who switch pitch.
Different lineup. No crede, cabrera, swisher. whos not in there? owens, erstad, richar, podsednik, tadahito, mackowiak, fields. only tadahito and fields are righty if my memory serves me correctly.
They also faced CC and roughed him up.

smartz · Apr 14, 2008

Burger King Mcdonalds is opinonated. BA is proven fact. And career averages to me hold alot more weight than 1 year or 2 week samples.

JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

smartz said:
They hit .246 as a team lefties and righties combined. And if they dont hit either well them not hitting lefties well is not of great significance. When you say they dont hit lefties well by deducing whats available its in comparison to how they hit righties. Unless there are pitchers who switch pitch.
Different lineup. No crede, cabrera, swisher. whos not in there? owens, erstad, richar, podsednik, tadahito, mackowiak, fields. only tadahito and fields are righty if my memory serves me correctly.
They also faced CC and roughed him up.

Getting ready to go to bed but will argue more in the morning probably.

PS, everyone has roughed up Sabathia. Something is wrong with him. The A's hit him hard twice and they another team I don't think can hit lefties at all.

LittleBuddha · Apr 14, 2008

You're guys are funny with your "lefty" argument. These are major league ball players. They've all hit homers off of lefties and will continue to do so. Not every lefty has "nasty" stuff and will leave all the hitters mystified. There's a small difference between guys like Johan and Bedard and guys like Smith and Z. Duke.

MikeB · Apr 14, 2008

smartz said:
Burger King Mcdonalds is opinonated. BA is proven fact. And career averages to me hold alot more weight than 1 year or 2 week samples.

Well, if they are not hitting up to thier career potential right now, I would be handicapping as to how they are doing coming into the game as opposed to how they did in previous years. I don't think that they are all going to have breakout games today to get thier avg's up. JMHO

Good luck with the under play, I think I'll play along. Thanks

dice711 · Apr 14, 2008

You think that last guy that got hit by the formula 1 car survived?

I don't.

JakeT. · Apr 14, 2008

dice711 said:
You think that last guy that got hit by the formula 1 car survived?

I don't.

I think he did. His leg got mangled more than anything.

punter · Apr 14, 2008

While watching the video I thought of, Rednecks last words "hey yall watch this"

Jake's Picks - MLB April 14th (plus a video of stupid people doing stupid stuff)

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