Texas Rangers vs. Los Angeles Angels Best Bet: Will Shohei Ohtani Put Them Away?
Texas Rangers vs. Los Angeles Angels Best Bet: Will Shohei Ohtani Put Them Away?
I can’t not play this. Ohtani is such a polarizing talent and his stuff looked amazing in his opener. To open the season against Houston we saw Ohtani strikeout 9 Astros in just 4.2 innings pitched. 9 of his 14 outs were strikeout. Tonight we see Shohei’s “recorded outs” line at 17.5 with no juice on either side. There’s a 50% chance he goes 6 full innings which would be 4 more out opportunities for the young pitcher. I know I’ve said that I will wait to do strikeout props until there’s a better size but we’re seeing a number here we simply shouldn’t be getting.
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Shohei Ohtani Over 5.5 K’s (-140) (Bet $140 to win $100)
*Odds Available at Caesars at Time of Publishing*
Texas has not allowed a starter to throw 6+ strikeouts against them thus far but they haven’t faced a legitimate strikeout threat so maybe that’s why we’re getting a discount. I put more stock into Ohtani’s history against these batters and last year he hit this prop in 4/4 games versus Texas and averaged 7.5 strikeouts per game among those four. Obviously, they have some new pieces but it’s still a great sign. Semien is one of those new guys and he has struck out 4 times in 9 at-bats versus him so I’m not worried about new faces. These Ranger bats have struck out 16 times in 49 at-bats which is near 33% of the time. Assuming he goes 6 innings that would put us right at the 6 strikeouts we need to hit.
The one downside of this bet is his home/away splits are significant but I’m putting faith forward that it won’t become a reoccurring theme throughout his career. He had 6 strikeouts and 9 strikeouts in Texas last year and the game with 9 came within his first few starts of the season last year, much like this one. -140 is definitely juicy but I see this for -160 or more on other books so I see this one moving to 6.5 before first pitch. I really like the value here and will gladly put my money at the fate of an MVP talent.