Date: <\/strong>Saturday, September 17, 2011 Detroit Tigers (87-63 through September 15)<\/strong> The Detroit Tigers have officially graduated from World Series sleeper to World Series contender. A 12-game winning streak will do that. The American League Central is theirs; a 13.5-game lead through Thursday means that the best any team can do is tie them.<\/p>\n But the dominant second half doesn\u2019t necessarily mean Detroit has nothing to fix heading into the playoffs. For one, the Tigers could breathe a lot easier if they got some solid starting pitching from someone other than Justin Verlander and Doug Fister.<\/p>\n Saturday starter Rick Porcello continues to tease with his talent. Still just 22 years old, he\u2019s shown great control this year, walking 40 batters in 162 innings. But Porcello has also been hittable, allowing a .291 opponents\u2019 average.<\/p>\n Porcello is 6-2 in 11 starts since the All-Star break \u2013 but with a 4.91 ERA. His success is more the product of run support than anything else. If he wants to help Detroit in the playoffs, he has to curb his homer rate in particular.<\/p>\n Oakland Athletics (68-82 through September 15)<\/strong> The Oakland A\u2019s are just playing out the string, guaranteed another sub-.500 finish after they were hyped as an AL Wildcard sleeper entering the 2011 season.<\/p>\n One of their few bright spots has been Gio Gonzalez, who starts Saturday. However, even he has been a source of stress lately. The All-Star\u2019s overall numbers are strong, fitting the profile of a power pitcher with a high strikeout and walk rate, but he\u2019s struggled mightily in the second half. He had a 2.47 ERA at the break and he sits at 5.00 since.<\/p>\n The pick:<\/strong><\/p>\n Not only is Gonzalez regularly getting lit up lately, he\u2019s never succeeded against the Tigers, going 0-3 with a 6.87 ERA in four starts against them. In those outings, he\u2019s lasted a combined 18.1 innings and allowed six homers.<\/p>\n A struggling pitcher versus a hot offense that has historically demolished him? Seems like an easy choice to me. Porcello ain\u2019t perfect but the Athletics\u2019 popgun attack isn\u2019t built to hurt him.<\/p>\n Tigers vs Athletics prediction: <\/strong>Tigers 6, Athletics 2<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" MLB Betting \u2013 Tigers vs Athletics Preview & Pick Date: Saturday, September 17, 2011 Venue: O.co Coliseum, Oakland, CA Broadcast: FOX Detroit Tigers at Oakland Athletics Betting Lines from Bodog.com Money Line: OFF Over\/Under: OFF Detroit Tigers (87-63 through September 15) Rick Porcello (14-8, 4.83) The Detroit Tigers have officially graduated from World Series sleeper […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":195,"featured_media":35736,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[670],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb-baseball"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43427","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\/195"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43427"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43468,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43427\/revisions\/43468"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nVenue: <\/strong>O.co Coliseum, Oakland, CA
\nBroadcast: <\/strong>FOX
\nDetroit Tigers at Oakland Athletics Betting Lines from Bodog.com<\/strong>
\nMoney Line:<\/strong> OFF
\nOver\/Under: <\/strong>OFF<\/p>\n
\nRick Porcello (14-8, 4.83)<\/p>\n
\nGio Gonzalez (13-12, 3.41)<\/p>\n