Bottom of the West

The Texas Rangers host the Oakland Athletics on Tuesday, September 13th at Globe Life Field. The game starts at 8:05 pm and will be the first of the last two games these two teams will play this season. These two have already played 17 games and this will be game 18. The Rangers currently lead the series 10-7 and won the last game.  The Rangers head into this game with a home record of 29-40 and the Athletics have a road record of 28-42. The odds for this game are currently -155 Rangers, +130 Athletics, and the over/under is set at 8.5 according to Caesars Casino & Sportsbook. New users will receive a Risk-Free Bet of up to $1250 on their first wager. When you make your first bet, if it loses, it’s on the house as Caesars will refund any losing wagers in full (up to $1250 in the form of a single-use bonus credit Plus Caesar’s is adding 1,000 Reward Credits and 1,000 Tier Credits). You must make a deposit to get the bonus! Click the link to sign up or use Promo OSBETFULL. Claim your bonus here!

The Oakland Athletics are currently 51-90 which is the last seed in the AL West and they have been eliminated from playoff contention. Over their last 10 games, they are 2-8 but are on a one-game winning streak. In their last series, they played against the Chicago White Sox where they won one of the four games they played at home. In this game against the Rangers, the Athletics will have Ken Waldichuk take the mound for them. On the season, Waldichuk is 0-1 with an ERA of 3.60 and a WHIP of 1.20. The Athletics are currently in last place for the number of hits in the league with 1,001. Catcher Sean Murphy leads the team in batting average, hits, RBIs, and OBP. As a team, they rank 30th in batting average with a .217. It gets a little better for the Athletics for pitching as they rank 24th around the league in ERA with a 4.46. The Athletics are going through a rebuilding phase and are really struggling but they do have some pieces to be optimistic about. In this game against the Rangers, they will need Waldichuk and Murphy to play well but also need batters Seth Brown and Tony Kemp to play well as they are tied for the second most amount hits for the Athletics. 

The Texas Rangers are currently 60-79 and are the fourth seed in the AL West. They have not been statistically eliminated from the playoffs but it pretty much is a done deal they will be missing out. Over their last 10 games, like the Athletics, they are 2-8 and are on a one-game losing streak. In their last series against the Toronto Blue Jays, they won one of the three games they played at home. In this game against the Athletics, Texas will start Cole Ragans. Ragans is 0-2 with an ERA of 3.80 and a WHIP of 1.45. Ragans has started a game against the Athletics already this season and it did not end in his favor. He pitched 5 innings and had an ERA of 5.40 after allowing 3 runs while only striking out three batters. The Rangers will need a better outing from him if they want to continue their winning streak. Texas ranks 13th in the league for the number of hits as they have 1,146.  As a team, they also have a batting average of .242 which ranks 16th best around the league. Hitting is not their strength and neither is pitching as they rank 21st in the league for ERA with a 4.16. The Rangers have only 4 batters that have over 100 recorded hits. Interestingly, the batters not only are above 100 hits, but they are also over 120. Nate Lowe leads the team with 157 and Corey Seager is fourth with 129. After Seager, Jonah Heim ranks behind him with only 83 hits. Lowe not only leads the team in hits, but he also leads in batting average and OBP. Seager leads the team in home runs and right fielder Adolis Garcia leads the team in RBIs. Second baseman Marcus Semien is right in the middle of all the hitting stats and while he doesn’t lead a category, he is a great hitter. The Rangers will need their batters to help out Ragans in this game if they want to win. 

In 14 of the 17 games played between these two, every game has ended with the winner winning by at least 2 or more runs. In the last game Ragans pitched, the final score was 7-2 Athletics. The season series is already won by the Rangers as they have won 10 games. Expect the Rangers to build off of their one-game winning streak and add another victory to their season series lead. 

For our expert, Oakland Athletics vs. Texas Rangers pick, take the Rangers run line.