MLB Baseball Betting Free Picks: San Diego Padres at Chicago Cubs

Added on Aug 18, 2010 by Jack Thurman in

MLB

Daytime baseball on Wednesday and we’ll head to Chicago where the Cubs will take on the San Diego Padres at Wrigley Field. Padres have split the first two games of the series and continue to lead the NL West, while the Cubs continue to sink like a stone in the NL Central.

San Diego Padres (Richard) at Chicago Cubs (Coleman)
August 18, 2010—11:20 AM Pacific

Got some money you’d like to throw into the street? That would probably net a better return on investment than betting on the Chicago Cubs at home. Year after year, the Cubs are overvalued at Wrigley Field for reasons that aren’t readily apparent. Sure, they’re one of the biggest ‘public’ teams in the sport at some point you’d think that even the squarest of the square would catch on to their money burning ways. So far it hasn’t happened—the public continues to throw money at the Cubs when they play at home and that’s clearly reflected in the lines which are almost always a good value play against Chicago. Despite the Padres having the best record in the National League and the Cubs being 20 games under .500, both of the first two games of this series were priced right around ‘pick’em’. Padres are a clear favorite today, but that’s only because this may be the worst matchup yet for Chicago in this series.

San Diego will start Clayton Richard, a competent lefthander who checks in with a 10-5 record and a 3.80 ERA on the year. He’ll be opposed by Casey Coleman who’ll make his first start after being recalled from Iowa of the Pacific Coast League. Coleman has been used so far in middle relief/mop up work where he hasn’t gone more than 3 innings. That means there’s a good chance the game will be turned over to the Cubs’ bullpen and their 5.03 ERA sooner rather than later. As bad as that ERA is, it pales in comparison to Coleman’s 8.64 ERA and 1/1 strikeout to walk ratio. No disrespect to Coleman, and we get that young pitchers are supposed to get lit up early in their career. We also have no issue with Chicago getting prospects playing time in a season in which they’re playing out the string. We’ll gladly go against him, however.

So let’s review the numbers—Cubs have lost -17.3 units at home this year, while the Padres have made their financial backers +16.1 units on the road. Padres have won eight of ten, Cubs have lost seven of ten. San Diego is also 13-4 against teams with losing records in the second half of the season. They’re starting to open up distance between themselves and second place San Francisco, and they should be able to take advantage of an opportunity to increase their lead against a floundering team with an inexperienced young pitcher on the hill.

Bet San Diego (Richard) -140 over Chicago Cubs (Coleman)