MLB Baseball Betting for June 17, 2016

Saturday night might be ‘alright for fighting‘ but Friday is alright for some baseball. That was pretty weak but I’ve got a good excuse. It’s been one thing after another this week. It started with my cellphones. I roll with two cellphones in the same way that some people have a sporty car and a pickup truck. The ‘pickup truck’ cellphone is my Nexus 6 and the ‘sporty car’ is my BlackBerry Priv. The Nexus 6 is just one of the best phones ever. It’s big and heavy but it’s built like a Sherman tank and has performance specs that can still hang with the latest phones. I actually bought it out of the contract with the cellphone company instead of returning it and upgrading. You’ve probably seen the meme with the ‘indestructible’ Nokia 3310? The Nexus 6 is the Nokia 3310 of our generation. The problem is that I left it in Salt Lake City when I flew out about a week ago. I was flapping around with my suitcase and laptop and set it down somewhere as I loaded my luggage in the Uber car. It actually fell off the Uber’s bumper on to my in-laws’ driveway but I didn’t know that so I gave it the ‘remote lock and wipe’ treatment. That leaves me with one phone which is primitive enough but not more than 24 hours after I got home minus the Nexus I was taking a system update on the Priv. I’m guessing it was corrupt because somehow it got stuck in bootloader mode. In fact, the bootloader itself probably got corrupted. So I’m without phones.

Making matters worse, I’m getting the bathroom remodeled this week. That’s not bad in itself but it’s the bathroom right outside of my office. It’ll be nice when its done but now there’s chunks of the bathroom walls, floors and fixtures strewn all over the upstairs. I’ve actually got the bathroom sink here in my office. I could deal with that but the workers are banging around and makes it hard to work or sleep.

MLB BASEBALL BETTING FOR JUNE 17, 2016:

ARIZONA DIAMONDBACKS AT PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES:

Weird matchup. The Phillies started the season in fairly decent form but are swirling down the toilet having lost 8 of their last 10. They were bludgeoned by the Toronto Blue Jays on Thursday and it was a dumpster fire even by Philadelphia’s meager standards losing 13-2. Manager Pete Mackanin called a team meeting which in baseball lore is supposed to be a big deal.

The Phillies are plenty boneheaded–for example, outfielder Odubel Herrera lost track of how many outs there were in one inning last night and threw the ball into the stands with only two out instead of three. The issues that are dooming the Phillies to a battle with Atlanta for the NL East basement have more to do with lack of skill than lack of effort. Even their good players aren’t playing well. Aaron Nola is a reasonably capable pitcher but he got beat up in his career worst outing yesterday. The offense is a bigger problem–they can’t hit. These are significant issues to be sure but not ones that can be dealt with by giving them a good talking to.

Arizona ain’t the ’27 Yankees but they can hit and they’ve turned a profit on the road. Within a month, the Phillies could pass the Braves in the wrong direction and be the worst team in baseball.

BET ARIZONA DIAMONDBACKS -145 OVER PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES

COLORADO ROCKIES AT FLORIDA MARLINS:

These are two nondescript teams but there’s one huge difference between the–the Rockies have been playing excellent baseball winning 8 of 10 and four straight. Florida is ‘treading water’ going 5-5 in their last ten games. They’ve also made some nice coinage on the road. Historically, the Rockies have been thought of as a ‘home loving’ team. They’ve got one of the most significant home field advantages in baseball though in recent years they haven’t built their team around the unique characteristics of Coors Field like they did in the past. There’s another reason that they’ve been thought of as a ‘play on’ at home–they’ve sucked on the road. Try these brutal numbers on for size–since 1997 Colorado is 617-963 away from Coors Field for a -178.3 unit loss. Or to flip that equation, if you’d blindly played against Colorado every game on teh road over the past (almost) two decades you’d have put +178.3 units in your pocket. This year so far they’re 17-17 on the road for a +7 unit profit. That’s pretty significant–even in the last three years they were 166-223 on the road for -39 units.

Form means so much in baseball. The Rockies have it and the Marlins don’t. We’ll take the team in better form as an underdog.

BET COLORADO ROCKIES +120 OVER FLORIDA MARLINS

About the Author: Jim Murphy

For more than 25 years, Jim Murphy has written extensively on sports betting as well as handicapping theory and practice. Jim Murphy has been quoted in media from the Wall Street Journal to REASON Magazine. Murphy worked as a radio and podcasting host broadcasting to an international audience that depended on his expertise and advice. Murphy is an odds making consultant for sports and 'non-sport novelty bets' focused on the entertainment business, politics, technology, financial markets and more.