San Diego Padres vs. Texas Rangers: MLB Picks

The Padres, one of the worst teams in baseball take on the best team, the Rangers. Matt Harrison and journeyman Jason Marquis will take the hill. Marquis has been a great addition to the Pads rotation but will he be enough to shut down the dangerous Texas line up?

The return of Jason Marquis 

Marquis was released from the Twins after he posted an ERA well over 6, going 46 innings with just 22 strike outs to 19 walks. The Padres picked him up, and he has been stellar. In his last start against Seattle, he went 6 1/3rd scoreless innings while scattering 6 hits. Over two starts with the Pads, he owns a 1.46 ERA. Marquis can still be a valuable pitcher, especially when pitching in the spacious PetCo Park. When we look at the numbers, Jason really hasn't been as bad as his 6.60 ERA would indicate. He owns a great ground ball percentage of 54.4 and his xFIP is 4.80, almost a full 2 points lower than his ERA. He has been burned by a 69% strand rate with a .352 batting average of balls in play and an insane 24% HR/FB ratio, meaning that when runners have reached base, they have crossed the plate; when the ball is hit in the air, it has gone yard, but with a 54% ground ball ratio, those numbers have got to start coming down and that is quite possibly what we are seeing now with him pitching for the Padres. 

Matt Harrison is one of the toughest lefties in the game when he is on 

Over his last 23 IP, Harrison has given up a total of just 3 earned runs. His last two starts were shutouts, one of them being a complete game against the Giants, so he is certainly feeling it at the moment. There are times when Harrison's mechanics get out of whack and he can get lit up like a christmas tree, but it seems he has made the correct adjustments of late. He has not given up more than 3 earned runs in his last 3 starts. Over those three games, he owns an elite ERA of of 1.17 and an even better WHIP of 0.87 while giving up just 15 hits in 23 IP. The Padres lineup is going to be turned over so quickly by Harrison it's not even funny.

Naturally enough considering the competitors, baseball odds makers currently have the Rangers as prohibitive -183 favorites. The total remains at 7.5.

Its going to be very hard for the Padres to get runs tonight

San Diego went on a stretch where they were swinging some hot bats against some very good pitchers, but, in their last 4 games, they are right back to their old ways. They've scored more than 2 runs just once in their last four games and that came against Oakland's Tyson Ross, who has an ERA of almost 7. Against LHP, SD is hitting just .230 overall, has one of the worst OBP at just .299, and manages just 3.24 runs, which is absolutely brutal. 

With Jason Marquis feeling good and his numbers regressing to the mean, we just can't back the Rangers as almost an -180 road favorite, but what we can absolutely do is play the UNDER the posted total of 8. This SD lineup should be a breeze for Matt Harrison and it won't be surprisng at all if his shut out streak continues. The only way this one goes OVER is if the Rangers do it themselves, which is very unlikely in a huge ball park such as PETCO.