I think this is a very good inquiry and one of the purposes of this forum. Many people look at many different things when capping a game. Personally, I like to be patient and sit back a couple of series at the beginning of the season to get a good feel for teams and players. Below are some of the factors I consider when I do start playing:
Pitching matchups are one important aspect which I pay much attention to. I like to look at factors in pitching such as the health of the pitcher, make sure there is no pitch count restriction, etc. I usually stay away from a pitcher who is fresh off of the DL as they tend to not be as strong and a tad rusty. He maybe limited to pitches in these circumstances as well. Also, I pay attention to pitcher vs. batter matchups to see if a lineup, as a whole, has struggled or been successful vs. a pitcher in the past. Also, some lineups, collectively, may struggle against lefties; whereas, some lineups may do very well against righties. So pay attention to a teams bullpen roster in these circumstances. You can find these statistics on
www.espn.com.
There are other intangibles that are very important to consider such as game time. Some afternoon games have an effect on scoring due to the position of the sun i.e. depending on the stadium, shadows fall between the mound and the plate and make it hard to see the ball for a batter....love hitting the -under first 5 innings- in some of these circumstances.
Also, I
always check the weather before making a play on a game; particularly, the wind. For example, when the wind is blowing in strong at Wrigley, it is very likely to be a very low scoring game. When it's blowing out hard, you can bet the scoring will be much higher than usual. Here is a link that I use to follow the wind conditions:
http://dailybaseballdata.com/cgi-bin/weather.pl.
One more consideration is the stadium. Some ballparks are very pitcher friendly such as Petco in San Diego. Some parks are very hitter friendly such as Colorado and Texas. When the wind is blowing from the south in Texas, it creates a jet stream inside the stadium that blows out. What would normally be a pop fly turn into a homer under these conditions. So keep info like this in mind when looking at a game.
There are many other factors I consider as well such as being careful with a team who is in the middle or toward the end of a long road trip ie. "road weary", umpire crews (see game matchups at
www.covers.com), etc., but above are a few of the most important aspect I look at.
Lastly, utilize this forum. There are many good cappers in here. Also, there are a lot of people in here that offer very good information on games. This can be very helpful throughout the season.
Best of luck :toast:
Hookem