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MLB Best Bets Today: Oakland Athletics vs. Texas Rangers
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Oakland Athletics vs. Texas Rangers
The Oakland Athletics take on the Texas Rangers in the final game of a three-game series between division rivals. These teams split the first two games of the series with the Athletics winning the first game on a walk-off single while the Rangers handily took the second game 5-1. This will be a very emotional game for a lot of people, as it will be the last game ever in Oakland for the Athletics and the last baseball game at the Oakland Coliseum.
The Athletics are moving to Sacramento next season while they await their baseball stadium in Las Vegas to be constructed before moving there full-time. This is a very controversial move with a lot of the blame being put on Oakland owner John Fisher, and I couldn't agree more. It has been very frustrating being an Athletics fan for a while now as Fisher completely slashed payroll and has strictly become a Moneyball team. The Athletics have been putting out a losing product for a very long time now and they refuse to spend the money to put their team over the top to legitimately contend. They have traded just about every one of their top players as soon as their rookie contract is up instead of paying them what they deserve and keeping a capable team intact. The largest contract the Oakland Athletics ever gave out was in 2004 before Fisher took over ownership of the team. It was a six-year, $66 million deal with Eric Chavez. It's honestly very sad even reading about this and seeing how dirty Fisher has done the Athletics. The highest-paid player ever in the John Fisher era was Coco Crisp. He made about $53 million on a couple of different contracts between 2010 and 2016. Guess what happened to him? Yep, he was traded. It seems to be the same issues hampering the Athletics over and over again and the common denominator is John Fisher. He ruined the storied history of baseball in Oakland and didn't give it much thought either. That said, this is the last game ever in Oakland Coliseum. I would expect a sellout. The Athletics will want to play their best for the fans and I think they will pull through today.
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J.T. Ginn is making the start for the Athletics and he has been solid in seven appearances so far this season. He has only allowed more than three runs once, giving up four runs to the Reds at the end of August. He is 0-1 with a 4.05 ERA in September but that is mainly because he has pitched more than five innings just once. Kumar Rocker is making his third career start and has pitched very well in his first two starts. However, he has only pitched a combined seven innings in his two outings, with a combined six walks. I highly doubt he goes very deep in this game. I don't think he will go more than five innings even if he is pitching well. Both teams have been hitting righties pretty well lately. The Athletics are ranked 11th in wOBA against righties in the last 30 days while the Rangers are 13th. Neither bullpen has been very good lately. The Athletics' bullpen has the 28th-ranked bullpen ERA in the league the last 30 days while the Rangers are ranked 27th. The Rangers are playing better than the Athletics overall but most of that has come at home. They are 15-12 in the last 30 days but just 5-6 on the road. The Athletics are 12-15 in that time but just 4-8 at home. However, the Rangers are just 7-5 against the Athletics this season and I think Oakland will manage this game as if it were a playoff game. I like the Athletics to win their last game ever in Oakland.
Best MLB Bet Today
Athletics ML (-104 at FanDuel Sportsbook)
