A potential World Series preview is brewing on this weekend’s sports betting calendar in Houston where Jose Altuve and the Astros welcome Fernando Tatis Jr. and the San Diego Padres for a showdown.
San Diego Padres vs. Houston Astros
Saturday, May 29, 2021 – 04:10 PM EDT at Minute Maid Park
In addition to the series featuring a matchup of two playoff contenders, San Diego and Houston give us the classic immovable object vs. unstoppable force scenario. The Padres arrived for Friday’s series opener with a half-game lead over Los Angeles in the NL West, building the best record in the majors on the strength of a 2.60 ERA that is also tops in the bigs. The Astros are trailing the Oakland Athletics in the AL West by 1½-games, and have MLB’s top-scoring lineup.
Saturday’s skirmish will find Yu Darvish (5-1, 1.75) on the hill for San Diego while Jake Odorizzi (0-2, 10.13) returns from the injured list to reclaim a spot in Houston’s rotation. Top sportsbooks started the Padres out -145 on the overnight lines, with an 8-run total.
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San Diego began this 3-city road trip in Milwaukee earlier this week, splitting a long 4-game series with the Brewers. The Padres had won nine in a row before the trip started, and bookended the set with defeats. The final two games of the series each went 10 innings, manager Jayce Tingler making 11 calls to the bullpen in those contests.
San Diego has won nine of Darvish’s 10 trips to the hill this season, and the last six in a row while the 34-yeard-old pitched to a 1.45 ERA. He has only allowed one home run and two walks in his four May assignments, most recently dominating the Seattle Mariners at home with a 7-inning, 1-run effort as huge -300 chalk at BookMaker.
Darvish will be facing the Astros for the first time since Game 7 of the 2017 World Series, definitely a start he’d rather forget. At the same time, one of his best career outings came against the Astros, a start early in the 2013 campaign when he lost a perfect game with two outs in the ninth. His 15 career starts – including the playoffs – against the Astros have yielded a 4-7 record and 4.09 ERA; in Houston, Darvish is 4-2 with a 3.12 ERA over seven career starts.
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Houston enjoyed Thursday off following a split in a short 2-game set with the Dodgers. Astros relievers should be well-rested, though it has been a group that has struggled regardless of rest. Ryan Pressly has been solid in the closer’s role, but the rest of the arms in the bullpen have given manager Dusty Baker headaches much of the time.
Odorizzi becomes the second-straight Houston starter to come off the DL in this series, following Framber Valdez’s season debut on Friday. Sidelined for more than a month by a strained pronator muscle in his right forearm, Odorizzi probably can’t be expected to go longer than 80 tosses on Saturday night.
Given how he looked in three abbreviated April outings, he might also need help from an offense that has been outscoring opponents with regularity and sending games ‘over’ the betting odds at nearly a 2:1 clip on the season. Signing with Houston late and not having a lot of time during spring training probably didn’t help Odorizzi, who will be facing the Padres for the first time.
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After meeting 599 times as National League foes from 1969-2012, Friday’s series opener between the Padres and Astros will mark just the 10th matchup as inter-league opponents. Houston held a slim 5-4 advantage before the first game of the weekend set after the Padres swept the series in San Diego last season, two of the three games stopping short of the totals. When the clubs collided at Minute Maid Park in 2018, the Astros won twice with the ‘under’ sweeping the series.
Rain continues to plague the Houston area, so expect the lid to be on Minute Maid Park when this mid-afternoon contest gets underway. Speaking of expectations, the season-long battle between the Padres and Dodgers we all expected appears to be in full swing, and should fuel both teams to continue the strong runs they’ve been on. And I also expect Yu to be on his game once again Saturday night, keeping Astros hitters quieter than usual.
Free MLB Pick: Padres -145 at BetOnline
