Blue Jays try to add to Orioles' misery
Baseball Betting Lines
07/28/2010 -
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Jose Bautista may still not be a familiar name among many
baseball fans, but the Baltimore Orioles know all too well how good the
Toronto Blue Jays slugger has been this season.
The major league's leading home run hitter in 2010 will attempt to go deep for
a fourth straight game tonight, while Bautista's Blue Jays take aim at yet
another victory over the cellar-dwelling Orioles when the American League East
foes wrap up a three-game series at the Rogers Centre.
Toronto moved to an astounding 11-0 against the Orioles this season by virtue
of last night's 8-2 triumph, with Bautista homering twice and knocking in five
runs as part of a 4-for-4 performance at the plate. The two long balls give
the All-Star outfielder 30 on the season, and he's homered four times with
nine RBI over the Jays' last three contests.
"Nothing different in my swing, just my approach has changed a little bit,"
said Bautista about his recent success. "I'm starting to get ready a little
earlier in the at-bat."
Facing the Orioles has helped Bautista build his career-best numbers as well.
In Toronto's 11 victories over Baltimore this season, the 29-year-old has hit
.326 (14-for-43) with six homers and 15 RBI.
Vernon Wells chipped in a two-run double and both Fred Lewis and Yunel Escobar
collected three hits to help Toronto prevail for the fourth time in its last
five games overall. Starting pitcher Ricky Romero (8-7) turned in 7 2/3
effective innings as well, holding the O's to two runs and striking out eight
Baltimore hitters.
Kevin Millwood wasn't nearly as effective for Baltimore, with the struggling
veteran battered for six runs (five earned) on 10 hits over a 5 1/3-inning
stint.
"I just didn't make very many good pitches and when you are swinging the bat
as well as [Bautista] is, if you don't throw a good pitch, he's going to hit
it hard," Millwood said.
Adam Jones went 3-for-4 for Baltimore, losers of four in a row and 10 of 12
since the All-Star break, while Nick Markakis had two hits and drove in a run.
Tuesday's setback was also the Orioles' 10th in a row at the Rogers Centre,
where Baltimore has now lost in 15 of its last 16 visits.
With the Blue Jays in need of an extra starter due to having played a
doubleheader on Sunday, the team will call up Brad Mills from Triple-A Las
Vegas to pitch tonight's finale. The 25-year-old lefty made 16 starts for the
51s this season and compiled a 7-4 record with a 4.13 earned run average.
A fourth-round selection by Toronto in the 2007 draft, Mills did make a pair
of starts for the Blue Jays last season, with both coming against the
Philadelphia Phillies. The results weren't real good, as he was tagged for 12
runs and 14 hits -- including four homers -- over a 7 2/3-inning span while
registering a loss and a no-decision.
He'll be opposed tonight by Jeremy Guthrie in what possibly could be the
Baltimore hurler's final outing as an Oriole. Considered a potential candidate
to be dealt prior to Saturday's trade deadline, the right-hander has helped
his value with a pair of solid performances since the All-Star break.
One of those efforts came against the Blue Jays, with Guthrie limiting the
Jays to a run and striking out six in a 6 2/3-inning no-decision on July 17.
The 31-year-old followed up by yielding just two runs through seven frames to
defeat Minnesota on Friday, finally putting an end to a personal two-month
winless streak.
The former first-round pick was handed a loss at the Rogers Centre back on May
30 after being reached for four runs in six innings, and is just 2-5 with a
3.56 ERA in 13 career starts versus Toronto. Guthrie also has struggled on the
road during his trying 2010 campaign, having produced a 1-5 record with a 5.01
ERA in 10 away appearances.
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Edmont
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Halladay won for th
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My fellow Americans, as tempting as it may be to don the coat and HD-ready tie in order to deliver this State of the Game address before the cameras, I know better. As Brad Paisley sings on his latest album, "I'm so much cooler online."
The ideas for this annual essay to kick off the MySportsbook.com college football betting preview flowed like frat-house beer, which is to say they were cheap and spilled all over the floor. The 2007 season will be better than 2007, if only because there will be more of it. A year ago, the NCAA Football Rules Committee made two rule changes in the interest of speeding up the game. These changes went over like Kobe burgers at a vegan banquet.
To its credit, the rules committee rectified its mistakes. This season the clock once again will start when a kickoff is received, rather than when it is kicked, and the clock will not start so quickly on a change of possession.
However, kickoffs have been moved back five yards, to the 30, which will force more returns. (Thus forcing the clock to run. Clever, huh?) Special teams might decide a lot of games, because coaching strategy will come straight out of another new Paisley lyric (almost), I'd like to check you for kicks.
Paisley sings with a twang, which is why he's appropriate for this college football season. The sun coming up over the 2007 college football betting lines season rises from the south. It's a Southern football world. As the Southeastern Conference begins its 75th year, the power shift is noticeable.
Eight-figure budgets, glamorous settings -- and that's just for the head coaches. The SEC has four coaches who have won national championships -- the greatest aggregation of coaching know-how since Eddie Robinson dined alone.
Steve Spurrier, Phil Fulmer, Nick Saban and Urban Meyer have given lie to the idea that a conference championship game is too daunting a hurdle on the road to No. 1. In six of the past 10 seasons, the national champions played and won a conference championship game -- three of the six (Tennessee, 1998; LSU, 2003; Florida, 2007) from the SEC.
There will be more of the same this season, if the preseason prognostications are correct. Six SEC teams are in the preseason coaches' poll, more than from any other conference. Only one conference has talent so deep that a team with 15 returning starters, including the best quarterback in the league, from an eight-win season is considered an afterthought. That may speak more to Kentucky's losing legacy than to the wisdom of the predictions, but there you have it. And seriously, keep an eye on Wildcats QB Andre' Woodson.
The reach of the South extends all the way to No. 1. Take a look at the team that is a consensus pick to win the national championship. The quarterback is from Shreveport. The best wide receiver is from Nashville. The top recruit is from New Orleans.
So what's the campus doing in Los Angeles? Hey, it is the University of Southern California.
USC lost two Pacific-10 Conference games a year ago, the first time that had happened in five seasons, and university officials withstood the urge to form blue-ribbon panels to unearth the cause of such a disaster. Instead, the Trojans gathered themselves and routed Michigan, 32-18, in the Rose Bowl.
USC's losses at Oregon State and at UCLA last year should have given pause to those who question the Pac-10's football prowess (such as, without naming names, L.M. from Baton Rouge). The league only got deeper this season; Dennis Erickson is taking over an Arizona State team that never quite got out of its own way under his predecessor, Dirk Koetter.
Erickson will resume his quest to become the first coach to win a national championship at two schools. Both he and Spurrier, now in his third season at South Carolina, returned to college football at schools with lower profiles than where they won their titles.
That isn't the case for the third coach looking for the national championship double. You may have missed this, but NASA reported the astronauts on the space shuttle last spring made contact with what can only be described as beings from another galaxy.
The leader of the aliens said, "We come in peace," followed by, "So how do you think Nick Saban will do at Alabama?"
The public is reacting to the new Crimson Tide coach as if he is the Barry Bonds of college football -- beloved at home for what his fans believe he is going to do, hated on the road for his intimidating attitude and for what his detractors believe he did (bend NCAA recruiting rules). I made this comparison from the dais at a charity dinner in Mobile, Ala., last month, and the chill that washed over me didn't come from the air conditioning.
Saban will attempt to prove that he can remake in Tuscaloosa what he built in Baton Rouge, much like another member of the national championship fraternity. Bobby Bowden is attempting to remake at Florida State what he built at, um, Florida State. Bowden rebuilt his offensive staff, bringing in four new coaches led by Saban's former offensive coordinator, Jimbo Fisher, to jump-start an offense that has been dead for a couple of years.
The Atlantic Coast Conference is expected to show new signs of life, too. That is said with no disrespect toward last season's champion, Wake Forest, which provided one of the best story lines of 2007. The Demon Deacons begin this season in their customary position, overshadowed by the Virginia Techs, Miamis and Florida States.
It's not that Wake will find it difficult to duplicate its success in 2007 as much as the feeling that success engendered. Surprising success is the narcotic of sport. It never feels quite so euphoric the next time. Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese has figured this out. He refers to 2007, when a league looked down upon by fans and foes alike took three undefeated teams into November, as "Cinderella."
The fairy tale may be over, but the Big East has four genuine Heisman Trophy candidates in Louisville quarterback Brian Brohm, West Virginia tailback Steve Slaton and quarterback Pat White, and Rutgers tailback Ray Rice. Rutgers, as did Wake Forest and, of course, Boise State, proved last season that the have-nots in college football occasionally have quite a lot.
The Broncos' rousing 43-42 overtime victory over Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl has raised the profile of all schools in conferences that don't get automatic BCS bids. This season, TCU and Hawaii are the preseason favorites to burst through the BCS doors and earn an at-large bid. The Warriors return 14 starters from an 11-3 team, including quarterback Colt Brennan.
Brennan not only broke the single-season record with 58 touchdown passes in 2007, but he also led Division I-A in passing efficiency (186.0). The senior is expected to contend for the Heisman Trophy, and neither his success nor the rise of his team should come as any surprise in the 2007 season.
After all, Hawaii is the southernmost team in the country.
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