Guardians vs. Rangers prediction and odds for Sunday, July 16 (Cleveland's advantage on the mound)
By Josh Yourish
When nearly your entire starting lineup plays in the All-Star Game, there isn’t typically much rust coming out of the break.
The Texas Rangers haven’t shown any rust after 12-4 and 2-0 wins over the Cleveland Guardians. Now at 54-39 the Rangers will go for the sweep of the 45-47 Guardians.
Texas is first in the AL West and Cleveland is second in the Central.
Tanner Bibee will be tasked with fending off the sweep for Cleveland. Bibee is 5-2 in 13 starts this year, his rookie season, with a 3.34 ERA.
For Texas it will be Martin Perez. The lefty has struggled this year to the tune of a 4.81 ERA, but does have a 7-3 record.
Even with the shaky Perez on the mound, the Rangers are favorites at home in the series finale.
Guardians vs. Rangers odds, run line and total
Guardians vs. Rangers prediction and pick
Cleveland has done a good job of beating up on the rest of the AL Central this year, like a series win over the Royals before the break, but when they face real competition like Texas, it doesn’t go as well. A big reason for that is their lackluster offense and that lineup has an interesting matchup today.
The Guardians are 27th in the league in OPS against lefties because of their left-hand dominant lineup. They are also 27th in home runs against left-handers, so you would think it’d be a disastrous matchup against Perez.
However, Perez hasn’t been getting lefties out this season and is allowing an .876 OPS to left-handed hitters compared to .801 to righties. Lefties are actually hitting .327 against him and the Guardians have plenty of lefties that can hit for average, notably, Steve Kwan and Andres Gimenez.
That is enough to make me back Cleveland in this one. Even with how bad Perez has been and he has been bad, the Rangers are 11-6 in his starts, but he has a 5.32 FIP and Bibee has been fantastic on the mound for Cleveland. Plus, the Guardians have the second best bullpen by ERA.
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