Michael Alexander

Rating: 2 Units

The Blues took last night's game by a score of 4-0. While tonight's game is essentially now meaningless, last night's poor effort should bring out the best in the Wild. Though staying healthy is key, teams also want to turn up the intensity before the playoffs. The Wild didn't do that last night. While the Blues are 5-6 (-3.1) when playing the second of b2b games, the Wild are 7-3 (+3.2) when doing so. Consider Minnesota.

Rating: 4 Units

The Rockies played a doubleheader yesterday against an opponent with the National League’s best bullpen, who started All-Star and Cy Young-quality guys Yu Darvish and Blake Snell. Also, the Padres had key hitters out because of the ol’ Virus Thing. It was a depleted lineup, with Fernando Tatis the most noteworthy absence. Tonight, after working through the bullpen in a doubleheader, they ask Chi-Chi Gonzalez to give them some innings against a heavier hitting lineup averaging 5.24 runs per game. The Reds are averaging only 3.59 runs per game on the road but ah, they haven’t played a game in Coors Field yet, or faced Chi-Chi, against whom opposing hitters often Cha-Cha around the basepaths. Their own starter, Luis Castillo, hasn’t been pitching like the guy everyone knew the last two seasons. He has a 1.63 WHIP and 6.42 ERA. Usually, pitching in Coors Field isn’t going to help a guy who’s going like that. Both of these bullpen can take a 7-0 lead and turn it into a 7-6 game faster than you can say, ‘Rob Dibble!’

Rating: 3 Units

Raptors’ head coach Nick Nurse says he is “extremely optimistic” about a young, developing group. Dude, your franchise won the NBA Championship two seasons ago. So many of the players from that squad are on other teams already. Your country didn’t want you this season. What are you optimistic about? Doesn’t seem like Fred Van Vleet or Kyle Lowry will see the floor again this season, leaving Malachi Flynn, Deandre Bembry and Jalen Harris to mishandle the ball and sometimes dish it to Yuta Watanabe for another missed shot.

Rating: 2 Units

Another of our most reliable coaches in play tonight when Miami's Erik Spoelstra hopes to do everything in his power to help secure a coveted 6th see in next weeks upcoming NBA playoffs.  Currently in a wild scramble with the Celtics and Hawks in the Eastern Conference playoff race to secure a No. 6 seed, the Heat will have a double revenge chip on their shoulder tonight after being handled twice in back-to-back contests in Philly in January.  That turns it all over to Spoelstra, who brings a lofty 48-24 SU and 46-26 ATS record into the contest when playing with same season revenge from a conference loss of 12 or more points, including 17-6 ATS from Game 70 out.  Spoelstra is also 32-11 SU and 31-12 ATS at home from Game 60 our versus .666 or grater opponents.  With the Sixers just 7-11-2 ATS away in non-divisional game under had coach Doc Rivers, we're all over Miami.

Rating: 3 Units

Denver is locked into either a third or fourth seed in the West. They beat the Wolves in back-to-back games this season. In the first win Jamal Murray had 36 points and thhe Wolves Karl-Anthony Towns didn’t play while Anthony Edwards had 5 points. In the second Denver win over this club this season Denver had to rally to win by 7 points and again Towns didn’t play. Murray is out indefinitely. The Wolves have won 6 of their last 9. Three of those wins were by between 14 and 32 points and one of the losses came in overtime.

Rating: 2 Units

The Knicks are comfortably in the playoffs even though they dropped a couple of slots on Tuesday while the Spurs will have to fight in ‘play in’ competition. The Spurs were in Brooklyn on Wednesday and San Antonio never recovered after losing the first quarter by 15 points. The Texans beat the Knicks in their only match-up this season but the Knicks had excuses. Julius Randle only had 14 points, 2 New York starters had 7 points combined and Elfrid Payton and Derrick Rose didn’t play. This is the first game back for the Knicks after going 3 and 3 on the road including an overtime loss to the Lakers on Tuesday. The Knicks have had 3 other road trips this season of at least 4 games and they won the first game back all 3 times.

Rating: 2 Units

The White Sox drubbed the fading Twins again last night, and they will send another effective pitcher in today's series finale. Lance Lynn has a stellar 1.52 ERA in five starts this year, and he should fare well against a Minnesota team that is only 7-14 (-$1420) in day games. Chicago is on top in the AL Central and riding a five game winning streak. Great price on the hot road team today at Guaranteed Rate Field.

Rating: 4 Units

The Mariners seem to have picked a good spot for the Major League debut of Logan Gilbert, their #1 pick in the 2018 draft. He has wowed ‘em in the minors following the requisite Tommy John surgery, and made a quickie appearance in spring training fanning four Angels in two innings. Did they start him in Dodger Stadium against the Dodgers? Of course not! They’re starting him against a lighter-hitting team in their own, larger, pitcher-friendly ballpark. Where they’ll have trouble separating on the scoreboard because they don’t hit much and Zach Plesac — who they’ve never faced — is pitching pretty well for the Indians. He hasn’t allowed a run to the Reds or White Sox in his last two starts, a 3-0 loss and 5-0 win.

Rating: 2 Units

A double-shot of love, or like, or just gut-feel on tonight’s match-up between the Indians and Mariners in Seattle for several reasons. The Mariners average the fewest hits per game in Major League Baseball. They’re only getting 6.46 hits per game. Hard to score a lot of runs getting less than 7 hits per game. But the Indians are right behind them, or ahead of them, or however you want to look at it, #29 in hits per game at 6.82. Tonight is the MLB debut of Seattle righthander Logan Gilbert. He was their #1 draft choice in 2018 and has zipped through the minor leagues with a 5.5 to 1 K-BB ratio and ERA barely above 2.00. He threw 2 innings against the Angels in a March exhibition game and struck out Mike Trout and three others. He would have been with the team from opening day but the Mariners could save money on contracts by waiting until now to bring in some rookies. Who can blame them? It’s their team, their money. The team president got fired for admitting as much, which is one of the problems with the world today. These ballplayers make enough money. The team that pays it should be able to do what it wants to do, say what it wants to say about it. Anyway, Zach Plesac is making the Indians look smart for not wanting to pay the big money to that whiny righthander guy on the Dodgers and the other righty who’s injured on the Padres. He has a 1.03 WHIP, 31-7 K-BB, the Mariners have never faced him, and the best bullpen around for after he’s done.

Rating: 3 Units

Good things tend to happen when Jack Flaherty starts for the Cardinals. We keep saying he’ll be a -160 or greater pitcher as a matter of routine, and yet here is as underdog pitching for the team with the second best record in MLB at the moment. A bit counterintuitive on the part of ‘The Man’ to make a team 7-0 with this pitcher starting, with baseball’s second-best record and better overall hitting than the home team, the underdog. Flaherty has a 2.83 ERA, 0.94 WHIP, 42-11 K-BB in 41 1/3 IP. Corbin Burnes’ numbers are better. But he hasn’t started since April 26 and the Brewers are only 2-3 when he starts because, as we said, they don’t hit as well as the Cardinals. They’ve lost 8-0, 3-1 and 2-0 games started by Burnes, the 3-1 loss at St. Louis when he was opposed by Adam Wainwright.