Oakland Athletics vs. Baltimore Orioles Prediction: Can the Orioles Spoil the A's Home Opener?
Oakland Athletics vs. Baltimore Orioles Prediction: Can the Orioles Spoil the A's Home Opener?
The Oakland Athletics and Baltimore Orioles have been competing to start the season. The Orioles just defeated the New York Yankees in a weekend series and the Athletics are sitting at .500 with five wins to start the year.
Expectations are low for both of these teams, but when this series is over, one team is going to feel much better about themselves moving forward. Which team can get a head start tonight? Here are our picks, predictions, and odds for Wednesday's game between the Baltimore Orioles and the Oakland Athletics.
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Athletics vs. Orioles Start Time, Where to Watch, and Odds
- Date: April 18, 2022
- Game Time: 9:40 pm ET
- Where to Watch: NBCSCA/MSN2
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Orioles vs. Athletics Injury Report
Orioles
Out: C Adley Rutschman (Triceps), OF Shed Long (Lower Leg)
Athletics
Out: Ramon Laureano (Suspension)
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Orioles vs. Athletics Line Movement
Oakland Athletics vs. Baltimore Orioles Prediction
The Oakland Athletics don't have the most exciting lineup in baseball. Dating back to last season, against righties, the Athletics have a .159 ISO and wOBA of .282. However, this season, the Athletics are starting to show some fight.
Oakland will take on right-handed pitcher Spenser Watkins who has an xFIP of 6.02 with 13.3% strikeouts and 7.7% walks. Watkins rarely gets ground balls, struggles to keep line drives down, and gives up nearly 50% hard contact.
Righties have a .437 wOBA and ISO of .320 in 144 plate appearances dating back to last season against Watkins and lefties have a wOBA of .345 with an ISO of .207.
Oakland's home ballpark isn't always exciting for over bets, but the Athletics have plenty of potential when it comes to scoring runs with Seth Brown, Sheldon Neuse, and Jed Lowrie who all have high power numbers against righties dating back to last season
On the other hand, Frankie Montas will get his third start of the season. Montas' first start was lame against the Phillies, where he allowed six hits and five runs in five innings. However, Montas allowed just two runs and one earned run against the Rays, on the road for his second start.
A home start should help Montas get back in sync on the mound. The Orioles have Cedric Mullins as the only real threat when it comes to power and on-base average. The Orioles won't hit many grounders against Montas but Montas should be able to earn plenty of strikeouts knowing the Orioles' projected lineup strikes out 25.4% of the time against righties.
To keep things simple, I'm going to look at the Athletics and their team total over in the first five innings.
Oakland Athletics vs. Baltimore Orioles Pick
- Athletics Over 2.5 TT F5 (+125) (Bet $100 to Win $125)
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Article Author
Jason grew up an avid sports fan. His passion for sports writing grew in high school and he developed a blog that was strictly for New York Sports. From his work, you will quickly realize that he loves looking at games from an analytical and numbers perspective and hopes to provide you with that same perspective in his articles.