Why the Yankees are now favored to win Red Sox series

After splitting the first two games of their American League Divisional Series with the Red Sox, the Yankees are now market favorites to advance to the next round. First adjustments offshore moved the Yanks to -135 to win the series (Boston +115), which resumes Monday night at the Stadium.

Early lines for Game 3 favored New York’s Luis Severino at -170 over Rick Porcello (+155). When the Red Sox announced Sunday afternoon Nathan Eovaldi would get the start instead, global sports books largely stood pat.

Porcello and Eovaldi are power-rated at the same level.

Why is New York now favored to advance past a team that won 108 games in the regular season? Yanks should win Game 3 slightly more than 60 percent of the time based on Severino’s price.

And, thanks to a “service break” at Fenway, they now have home-field advantage in a “best-of-three” mini-series.

Also in the mix … were the series to return to Boston, Yankee piñata David Price might be in line to get more innings. Price couldn’t even finish two full innings Saturday night in Boston’s loss.

Focusing on the crux of creating and preventing scoring opportunities shows how impressively the Yankees performed in the first week of the postseason. Here’s a quick read on “total bases plus walks” for each game.

Total bases plus walks

Wild Card: NYY 21, OAK 13
ALDS Game 1: NYY 18, BOS 15
ALDS Game 2: NYY 24, BOS 12

The coin of the realm for baseball production has yielded a jackpot so far. And, that’s against high-quality competition — with two games coming on the road, one of which was started by hard-throwing ace Chris Sale.

Though betting markets rate Eovaldi and Porcello similarly, Yankees sluggers might have preferred to see Porcello. He’s become more home-run prone later in his career. Though he improved from an astronomic 38 dingers allowed in 2017 (when a change in ball construction helped simulate a “juiced ball” scenario), the 27 he allowed in 2018 were the second-worst total of his career (ninth worst in the AL this past season).

Porcello also has a poor career ERA of 5.56 at Yankee Stadium, with a vulnerable WHIP of 1.42. Eovaldi’s been much more successful in The Bronx, with a career ERA of 3.70 and a WHIP of 1.25.

Note that the other ALDS, Houston versus Cleveland, also resumes Monday. Houston won the first two games at home by scores of 7-2 and 3-1, with dominant “total bases plus walks” advantages of 27-5 and 17-8. In a must-win spot, Cleveland with Mike Clevinger is -118 over Houston with Dallas Keuchel (+108) in Game 3.

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