MLB Baseball Betting: Seattle Mariners at Toronto Blue Jays

This is a very important weekend for all three of the top teams in the AL East. Pending Friday’s results–the Boston Red Sox lead the division by 1/2 game over the Baltimore Orioles and 1 1/2 games over the Toronto Blue Jays. With the Blue Jays hosting a mediocre-at-best Seattle Mariners team this weekend they’ve got a good chance to pick up some wins which depending on what the Orioles or the red hot Red Sox (9-1 L10) do will either allow them to advance or keep pace in the divisional race. Toronto has been playing well of late–entering Friday’s play they had won three straight and 7 of 10. Seattle–as we noted at the outset–is ‘decidedly mediocre. They’re 48-47 on the year, 23-34 on the road, 25-23 at home and (surprise, surprise) have split their last 10 games. They’re stuck in third place in the AL West at the moment 6.5 games out of first and 3 games behind the second place Houston Astros. They’re 5 games up on the LA Angels who have been red hot lately (8-2 L10).

Seattle will start righthander Hisashi Iwakuma who has been a very solid pitcher in past seasons and looks to be rounding into form now. Seattle has won 12 of his 19 starts on the season including 6 of 10 on the road. They’ve also won his last three starts. On the season, Iwakuma has a 4.01 ERA and a 1.286 WHIP while on the road his ERA is 3.69 and WHIP 1.374. In his last three starts he’s got a 2.29 ERA with a 1.068 WHIP. The biggest problem he has in this matchup is that Toronto has hit right handed pitching very well this year averaging 5.4 runs per game with a 40-27 +6.1 record.

He’ll be opposed by knuckleballer R.A. Dickey who has also pitched well in his last three assignments. He’s been erratic this season with Toronto having a 7-13 record overall in his starts and a 2-8 record at home. They’ve won 2 of his last 3 starts with Dickey putting up a 2.70 ERA and a 1.100 WHIP. We’ll back Toronto here–Seattle is 2-8 -5.2 units as a road underdog in this price range (+125 to +150) and the Jays have been in very good form overall.

BET TORONTO BLUE JAYS -145 OVER SEATTLE MARINERS