{"id":22361,"date":"2010-05-08T01:12:10","date_gmt":"2010-05-08T06:12:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.capperspicks.com\/blog\/?p=22361"},"modified":"2023-02-07T06:36:44","modified_gmt":"2023-02-07T14:36:44","slug":"tampa-bay-rays-vs-oakland-athletics-picks-lines-70510","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/mlb-baseball\/tampa-bay-rays-vs-oakland-athletics-picks-lines-70510\/","title":{"rendered":"Rays vs. A&#8217;s MLB Pick \/ Gambling Preview (May. 8)"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>MLB Thursday Preview \u2013 TAMPA BAY vs OAKLAND &#8211; 10:05 PM<\/h2>\n<p>Before\u00a0<a href=\"\/mlb\"><strong>baseball gambling<\/strong><\/a> fans turn their attention to other sports betting events this weekend, we have the Saturday MLB game of the day pick for you. It\u2019s time for our weekly baseball picks for online MLB betting action.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Season Record:<\/strong><br \/>\nTAMPA BAY (21 &#8211; 7)<br \/>\nOAKLAND (15 &#8211; 14) <!--more--><\/p>\n<p><strong>Rookie Davis Looking For 4<\/strong><sup><strong>th<\/strong><\/sup><strong> Straight Win<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Tampa Bay Rays are enjoying one of their best starts in franchise history, and those who\u00a0bet on sports know they have established themselves as one of the, if not the, best team in the American League.<\/p>\n<p>They\u2019re 20-7 record is the best in the AL since 2005. They\u2019re pitching well and they\u2019re hitting well.\u00a0 They can win at home and they can win on the road. They\u2019re playing great team defense. They are the most complete team in the league. Oakland, however, is not as talented but do share an important stat with their cross-country rival; they too are a division leader.<\/p>\n<p>The A\u2019s have surprised a lot with their start to the season, one that sees them atop the AL West. Oakland showed a lot of grit taking two of three in a recent series against Texas; the Rangers are right behind the A\u2019s for the division lead.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.betonline.com\/sports-betting\/baseball\/mlb\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"><strong>MLB Betting<\/strong><\/a> \u2013\u00a0<strong>Tampa Bay Rays @ Oakland Athletics<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Wade Davis (3-1) vs Ben Sheets (1-3)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Davis vs Athletics Hitting<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The rookie Wade Davis is enjoying a fine start to the 2010 season. After struggling in his debut, Davis has calmed down and has won his last three decisions. His latest win was possibly his best outing so far this year. Davis went head-to-head with Kansas City ace Zack Greinke and came out on top in a 1-0 Tampa win. The Rays righty went seven innings, allowing zero runs and striking out five.<\/p>\n<p>However, the Athletics have seen Davis already this season and\u00a0online betting knows they weren\u2019t necessarily overwhelmed. Davis got the win in the matchup, although his numbers in the game weren\u2019t spectacular. He lasted only five innings and gave up four runs on seven hits. Shortstop Cliff Pennington did the most damage; he went 4-for-5 with 4 RBI\u2019s, including a two-run shot off Davis in the third inning.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Sheets vs Rays Hitting<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Ben Sheets, one of Oakland\u2019s prized offseason acquisitions, has been struggling mightily as of late. His last start was undoubtedly his worst of the season; he lasted only three innings and gave up nine runs on ten hits. In the start before that, against the same Tampa Bay lineup he\u2019ll be facing on Saturday, Sheets allowed eight runs over four innings of work. His control has been off, his velocity has faltered and he just does not look comfortable on the mound. <iframe allowtransparency='true' src='http:\/\/ff.connextra.com\/Bodog\/selector\/client?client=Bodog&#038;placement=Ext_RS_Sports_250x250&#038;cxt_aff_id=151627&#038;tclk=http:\/\/www.bodog.eu\/welcome\/151627\/' class=\"alignleft\" style=\"margin: 1px; border: 3px solid #FFFFFF;\" width='250' height='250' scrolling='no' frameborder='0' style='border-width:0'><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Sheets\u2019\u00a0recent outing against Tampa was the first time he had faced them in his career. No doubt he\u2019d like a better result in his second outing.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Bullpen Comparison<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Rays bullpen has been pitching pretty well this season, with Rafael Soriano, Grant Balfour and Dan Wheeler are all sporting ERA\u2019s under 3.00. However, those who\u00a0bet sports know the bullpen has been one of the biggest strengths for Oakland all year, especially though as of late. Oakland relievers were fantastic in the recent series against Texas, as guys like Tyson Ross, Brad Ziegler and Andrew Bailey kept Oakland in games they really had little business winning.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Outlook<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Rays should win this easily. They have a much stronger pitcher on the mound and a much better lineup to do damage with. Davis is much more likely to have a bounce-back game against Oakland than Sheets is against Tampa Bay. This is pretty close to a lock for the Rays.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Gambling Trends:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>TAMPA BAY is 39-48 (-16.9 Units) against the money line when playing against a team with a winning record over the last 2 seasons.<br \/>\nTAMPA BAY is 21-7 (+9.7 Units) against the money line in all games this season.<br \/>\nTAMPA BAY is 12-1 (+12.0 Units) against the money line in road games this season.<br \/>\nTAMPA BAY is 12-1 (+12.0 Units) against the money line in games played on a grass field this season.<br \/>\nTAMPA BAY is 9-1 (+8.1 Units) against the money line in road games in night games this season.<br \/>\nTAMPA BAY is 10-1 (+10.0 Units) against the money line in road games after a win this season.<br \/>\nOAKLAND is 167-196 (-53.7 Units) against the money line in May games since 1997.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pick: Tampa Bay Rays<\/strong><\/p>\n<h3>START MLB GAMBLING TODAY AT BODOG SPORTSBOOK &amp; CASINO\u2026.CLICK HERE TO JOIN!!!<\/h3>\n<p><strong> <\/strong><br \/>\n<em><strong>Poolside Rants hails from beautiful Bozeman Montana by way of Toronto, Canada. (Blame his wife for the move). He&#8217;s a Dallas Cowboys football honk. But please&#8230;.don&#8217;t hold that against him. The man knows his sports and has uncanny knowledge when it comes to picking games.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Poolside rants weighs in with some picks for Saturday baseball action&#8230;MLB style. The Tampa bay Rays and the Oakland A&#8217;s will both be trying to pick up a win tonight when they battle at Oakland Coliseum. Odds currently favor the Rays listed as 145-moneyline favorites at most books&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":68,"featured_media":22363,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[670],"tags":[16918,28759,2058,677,11577,692,13695,28817,28818,28819,28820,27927,13293,17100,1161,1213,28821,28822,28823],"class_list":["post-22361","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb-baseball","tag-betting-services","tag-lohse-vs-halladay","tag-mlb-baseball-betting","tag-mlb-bet","tag-mlb-bet-online","tag-mlb-previews","tag-online-mlb-betting","tag-rays-athletics-lines","tag-rays-athletics-odds","tag-rays-athletics-picks","tag-rays-vs-athletics","tag-saturday-mlb-baseball-picks","tag-saturday-mlb-picks","tag-sports-bet-online","tag-sports-picks","tag-tampa-bay","tag-tampa-bay-rays-vs-oakland-athletics","tag-tampa-bay-vs-oakland-preview","tag-tampa-bay-vs-oakland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22361","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/68"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22361"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22361\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":103089,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22361\/revisions\/103089"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}