Halos Will Start Series With A Win

Red Sox vs. Angels, 9:38 ET

I finally got off the schneid with my last baseball post. It felt good to be correct once again with one of the baseball posts and I actually was able to get the main play and the run line play on that one. Today I'm turning my attention to another game on the diamond. The Red Sox and Angels take the field to battle in the first game of a three-game set.

The two teams have actually played each other already in the season. With the squads being on opposite coasts, they won't see each other again all season. The Red Sox were able to take three of the four games in their first series. The Angels may be looking to get their revenge. The Red Sox have already been on the West Coast, so there isn't any body clock advantage. I'm a bit surprised that Boston is playing as well as they are this season. They are five games over .500 but have been pretty average on the road this season. The Angels are also above .500 which is kind of a nice surprise. I don't think they have enough pitching to keep this up all season, but it is good to see they are playing decently. Offensively, the two teams match up very well and have similar statistics for the season - both have an average over .260 and roughly 60 home runs on the season. Even their pitching statistics are pretty similar.

The Red Sox are opening this series with Tanner Houck taking the ball. He's been pretty terrible this year with a 5.48 ERA. In night games, he has tossed 15 innings and allowed 12 earned runs. He has allowed at least two earned runs in each of his starts this season, which isn't that significant, but he's only going roughly five innings each start. He did face the Angels when they played in Boston, and he allowed two runs over four innings with four hits and four walks. For the Angels, this appears to be a bullpen game. They are using Jaime Barria to open it. This will be his 11th appearance this season, and the most innings he threw so far in any outing was four. He did face Boston earlier as well and allowed two walks in two innings. The Angels have one of the better bullpens in the AL, so they should have a nice chance to win in this game.

I like the Angels to take this game. I think both teams are playing pretty well, but I don't really care for Houck. The Angels offense is obviously what will need to carry them, and their team total is set at 4.5 which I think is too high to play, but in what is essentially a coin flip, I'll take their bullpen over the Red Sox starter and their 'pen. Play the Angeles at -115.

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