The Yankees offense has been abysmal lately, but their pitching continues to be a strength especially the bullpen (2.63 ERA road, 1.99 Last 10 games). Today they will send David Phelps to the mound who has been great on the year he's got a 1.16 WHIP on the road with a 3.66 ERA. He's getting 9.1 K/9, but walking 3.9 guys. He should be helped by the fact that the Angels are 27th swinging at 32.7% of pitches outside the zone. He's never made a start against the Angels but has faced them in 20 AB and only allowed 1 hit to Erik Aybar.
On the other side we have Tommy Hanson who continues to try to get back to his quality pitching days with the Braves. He's got a 1.70 WHIP at home and a 5.28 xFIP. His ERA could be worse, but he's got a 82.3 LOB%. He's only getting 23.8% outside the zone swings which is a big red flag. I see the Yankees offense thriving a bit and coming out of their slump tonight. I looked up their games against starters who struggle to get guys to swing at stuff outside the zone and they have won 90% of those games and put up some big runs. Yankees are smart they should be patient and work themselves into good counts and break out of their 4 game losing streak.
This spread opened up at -129 and has gone down to -120 with Zimmermann on the mound for the Nationals who has been arguably the best pitcher in baseball with a 2.00 ERA and a 0.89 WHIP. He faces a Indians team that's struggling to score runs just 3.68 runs per 9 over their last 10. They will also face Scott Kazmir? Why aren't they -150 or better?
Actually watching a few of Kazmir's starts I saw much better velocity and control over his pitches and even though he's off to an unlucky start with an ERA over 5 I expect good things from him. He has a 3.96 xFIP and faces a Nationals team that is scoring just 3.14 runs per 9 vs. LHP with a .200 average. He's backed by the Indians bullpen that has a 1.82 ERA over their last 10 games. I expect a low scoring game the Nationals are under the total 15-5-2 in their last 22 interleague games vs. LH starter. The Indians are 10-4 on the under in their last 14 interleague games as an under dog.
