The Texas Rangers look to get back in the American League West divisional race and have a golden opportunity to make up ground on Saturday when they are on the road facing the Seattle Mariners.
Texas Rangers vs. Seattle Mariners (-130, 6.5)
Nathan Eovaldi gets the start on the mound for Texas, who enters having allowed two runs or fewer in five straight starts and with a 2.68 ERA, which might be in for some regression.
Eovaldi’s 3.2 walks per nine innings is his second-most since 2014 and owns a 3.46 fielding independent and there’s pressure on Eovaldi to go deep into the game with the Rangers having a 4.67 ERA in the bullpen entering Friday, which is 26th among the 30 MLB teams.
While the Mariners bullpen has been significantly better this season, ranking 11th entering Friday with a 3.63 ERA, their ERA is 20th in the league the past 30 days with a 4.16 ERA and look to starting pitcher George Kirby for a good start on Saturday.
Kirby leads the league in strikeout to walk ratio among the qualifying pitchers with over 11.1 strikeouts for every walk he issues, but does own a 3.81 ERA despite his fielding independent of 3.04.
While Kirby’s superb 0.8 walks per nine innings rate means players need to hit the ball to get on base, that also means there will be plenty of strikes for opponents to hit and now has to face a Texas lineup that is averaging 4.7 runs per game away from home compared to 3.9 runs per game at home.
While the Mariners entered the series 27th in the league in runs per game with less than 3.9 runs per game, they are seventh in percentage of at-bats that result in a home run and with the way the Rangers are generating runs on the road coupled with the bullpen issues they’ve had, offensive fireworks are imminent on Saturday.
The Play: Rangers vs. Mariners Over 6.5 Runs
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