MLB Baseball
2012-04-10 - Pittsburgh Pirates at LA Dodgers
A Sports Betting Pick by Auls
United States: Major League Baseball
Tuesday 10 April 2012 - First Pitch 4:10pm ET
9:10pm (British Standard Time)
Preview
The LA Dodgers (4-1) open up their second series of the season and their first game at home since the takeover of the franchise by a Magic Johnson led consortium. While the new owners will not take over officially at the end of the month, this is still an exciting time for this famous franchise. They entertain the Pittsburgh Pirates (2-1) who surprisingly beat the Philadelphia Phillies in their opening series of the season.
The Dodgers lost the last of a 4 game series against the San Diego Padres to open the season, but there were plenty of positives from the way their bats were working early in the season. More positives will come from the fact that their ace pitcher is returning to the mound.
Clayton Kershaw pitched 3 scoreless innings in the opening day of the season, but he was suffering from an illness and had to be pulled out early in that game and thus missed the decision.
This will be the first time Kershaw will be pitching against the Pirates since the 2010 season when he went 0-1 in 2 starts against them and finished with a 4.09 ERA.
Pittsburgh faced some tough pitching already this season against the vaunted Phillies' pitching staff. They only scored 7 runs in the opening 3 games, but they will expect their bats to start heating up after grabbing 5 runs in the last game.
They will send Kevin Correia to the mound and look for him to continue the hot form he showed on the road last season. The pitcher finished 12-11 last season with a 4.79 ERA, but he was an impressive 10-3 on the road with a 2.64 ERA.
He was tagged for 5 runs in 6 innings pitched against the Dodgers at home last season, but he has not pitched here at Dodger Stadium since 2010. He has a 3-2 record over the last 5 starts here with a 4.34 ERA.
The Dodgers will look to continue their hot form on opening day in their own stadium. They have outscored teams 27-7 in the last 4 games they have played at home on opening day.
Head to Head
The Dodgers have won 11 of their last 13 home games against Pittsburgh, and they finished 3-1 here last season.
LA won the season series 6-2 last season.
Other Interesting Trends
LA are 21-7 in their last 28 games as the home favourite.
They are 21-8 in their last 29 home games with Clayton Kershaw starting.
Pittsburgh are 25-62 in their last 87 games against a left handed pitcher.
They are 1-4 in their last 5 games as the underdog and Kevin Correia starting on the mound.
Prediction
I am going to take the Dodgers to win this game on the run line for the following reasons:
First, their bats have been extremely hot in the opening 4 games of the season and they have a tremendous record at Dodger Stadium in their last 4 opening day games here.
Second, Pittsburgh have already found it tough getting runs on the board against the better pitchers that Philadelphia sent out, and Kershaw matches their output while also getting more run support.
Third, the Dodgers have dominated recent games against Pittsburgh.
The Pick :
LA Dodgers 6-2 Pittsburgh Pirates
