My first play of the new MLB season. I think this number seems way too high here so I will take a shot on the under.
Here we have two pretty good pitchers, two pretty good bullpens and two miserable starting lineups. The under 8 1/2 looks like a gift to me.
Pittsburgh starts Zach Duke in this game and he really had a good year last year finishing the season with about a 4.00 ERA. He just doesnt get a lot of credit as his win loss record is always bad. Of course, playing for the Pirates everyone is going to have a bad win loss record.
Duke has gotten better every season of his career. He has a career 4.30 ERA. In 2008, he finished at 4.82 then in 2009 he improved it to 4.06. In his one start this season, he has a 3.60 ERA having given up 2 Earned Runs and 7 hits in 5 innings pitched. I expect even a better performance tonight as that was against a much better Dodgers offense than the Diamondbacks offense that he will face tonight.
On the other side, Dan Haren will be starting for the Diamondbacks. Haren is just a great pitcher who always flies under the radar. he doesnt get a lot of hype but consistently has better numbers than some pitchers who do. Haren brings a career 3.50 ERA with only 270 Walks and 1039 Strikeouts in 1233 innings. So here is a guy that in addition to a great ERA is striking out almost 1 batter per inning and giving up pretty much no walks.
In his first outing this year, Haren got the win pitching 7 innings, allowing only 1 run on 4 strikouts and 0 walks. Haren's current 1.29 ERA is one of the best in baseball through the first week of play.
Both offenses flat out stink.
The Diamonbacks starting lineup does not have a single play with a .280 or better lifetime batting average. They also dont bring much power. The lineup.
Conor Jackson Career BA .279
Stephen Drew .269
Justin Upton .274
Adam Larouche .273
Mark Reynolds .256
Miguel Montero .271
Chris Young .237
Kelly Johnson .265
Even though there are 4 lefties in this lineup, I beleive Zach Duke will have a pretty easy time with this lineup.
On the other side, the Pirates lineup is probably even worse. They start Iwamura, Mccuthen, Jones, Doumit, Miledge, Clement, Larouche, Morton, and Cedeno. This lineup looks to be something that Dan Haren could very easily shut out. In fact, I half expect him to do just that. Either way, the Pirates wont score more than 2 runs tonight.
When we get into the bullpens, (if that even happens) There should be more pitching domination. Last night, the Pirates bullpen went almsot 5 innings and gave up 1 run. The Diamondbacks bullpen has given up only 5 runs this season. Both teams do seem to have pretty solid middle relief. I certainly expect Haren to go at least 7 innings tonight and this game will easily go under the 8 1/2.
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DiamondBacks/ Pirates UNDER 8 1/2
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