Wednesday, October 2, 2013

MLB Daily Picks – FREE pick for October 2nd is Tampa Bay

MLB Daily Picks FREE pick of the day is Tampa Bay:

Fixture: Tampa Bay @ Cleveland
Time/Date: 8:07 PM ET, October 2, 2013
Pick: Tampa Bay
Odds: -114 (1.88 in decimal odds) @ Pinnacle



Tonight's game will be American League Wild Card Game game played in Cleveland. The winner of this game goes to Boston to play against the Red Sox in American League Division Series.

Tampa Bay comes to Cleveland after beating the Rangers 5-2 in elimination game two days ago, thus earning  a wild card spot for the 3rd time in four years.

Both Tampa Bay and Cleveland had strong finish to the regular season. Tampa Bay went 14-5 after September 12. Cleveland was even better, they had 10 consecutive wins to finish the regular season and they were 21-6 in September.

Cleveland had a really good schedule during the September, mostly playing sub-.500 teams. During the regular season Cleveland was only 36-52 against the teams with a winning record and they went 2-4 against Tampa Bay. Tampa Bay outscored them 30-23 in those 6 games. Tampa Bay took the 3 game series in Cleveland 2-1, outscoring them 20-10.

Tampa Bay's third baseman Evan Longoria is 11-for-19 (.579) with 7 home runs, 11 RBI's and 9 runs scored in final 5 games of the regular season. Their first baseman James Loney led the Majors with a club-record .351 batting average (97-for-276) in away games this season.

Alex Cobb will be starting for Tampa Bay tonight. He went 11-3, 2.76 ERA in 22 starts during the regular season. He finished the season with 3 consecutive wins, allowing 3 earned runs while striking out 26 in 23.1 innings of work combined. Cobb missed 2 months after being struck on the head by a liner on June 15, but since the return from disabled list he went 5-1, 2.41 ERA in 9 starts. Cobb is 2-1, 2.70 ERA in his career against Cleveland. He faced them once this year and recorded a win throwing 7 shutout innings. Tampa Bay is 4-1 in Cobb's last 5 starts as a road favorite and 4-1 in Cobb's last 5 road starts vs. a team with a winning record.

Cleveland is sending out 23-year-old rookie Danny Salazar who went 2-3, 3.12 ERA in 10 starts this season. Salazar began the season at Double-A Akron. He recorded a win in his first start of the season and then went 0-3 in his next 8 starts, before recording a win in his last start 7 days ago against the White Sox. Salazar was limited to 90 pitches in all of his starts.

Tampa Bay is 5-2 in the last 7 meetings against Cleveland and I expect them to win tonight.


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