Two teams trending in opposite directions meet on Sunday Night Baseball.
The pregame narrative: The Baltimore Orioles have won four straight and now lead the AL East by a game. The Texas Rangers, meanwhile, have lost six in a row and are well outside of a wild-card spot. I expect the O's to get out to an early lead and Ryan Mountcastle to record an RBI.
Check out my Rangers vs. Orioles picks for Sunday Night Baseball on June 30.
Rangers vs. Orioles picks
Best Bet: Orioles F5 -0.5 (-125)
Two southpaws take the mound tonight with Andrew Heaney (4.17 ERA) going for Texas and Cole Irvin (3.74 ERA) for Baltimore.
Neither have been lighting the world on fire this season but the Orioles are a significantly better team at hitting left-handed pitching.
Baltimore owns the sixth-best batting average (.264) and second-best wRC+ (126) vs. LHP while Texas sits 17th (.243) and 22nd (93) in those departments.
Truthfully, the Rangers haven't been hitting anyone well this year and it doesn't help that Corey Seager is listed as day-to-day after getting hit by a pitch last night. Texas is averaging 2.8 runs per game during its losing streak and is 2-4 against this line in that span.
With last night's 6-4 defeat, the reigning World Series champions have now lost nine straight road games. They're an abysmal 17-27 on the road this year while Baltimore is 29-16 at home.
The Orioles average the most F5 runs per game at home (3.40) of any team in baseball and have hit Heaney well in a decent sample size.
In 77 plate appearances, the team owns a .278 batting average and .305 xBA against the lefty, per Baseball Savant.
Key stat: Baltimore is 49-34 on the F5 run line, per EVAnalytics, which is the third-best mark in MLB.
Quick pick
Mountcastle 1+ RBI (+155): Mountcastle is struggling, there's no denying that. Baltimore's first baseman has just one RBI in his last eight games and is slashing .231/.251/.269 in that span.
He was given an off day yesterday and I like him to rebound against Heaney.
Mountcastle is hitting .306 with a .853 OPS agianst lefties this year and he's 4-of-8 with two doubles and two home runs against Heaney.
The O's cleanup hitter has the luxury of batting behind some of baseball's best talents.
Gunnar Henderson and Adley Rutschman both have on-base percentages north of .350 and Anthony Santander — who typically hits third against lefties — owns a .364 OBP versus southpaws.
Expect them to get on and Mountcastle to drive them home.
Picks made at 11:30 a.m. ET 06/30/2024.
