Hunter Brown’s Complete 360 Will Be The Difference

The Houston Astros will welcome the Colorado Rockies to Minute Maid Park for the first of a two-game series.

Houston struggled early in the season. However, they’re on a five-game winning streak and have won seven of their last ten games to get within two games from .500. More importantly, the Astros are only 5.5 games away from the Mariners in the AL West and are in second place in the division.

On the other hand, the Rockies are the National League’s worst team when looking at the MLB NL standings. They’re tied with the Miami Marlins with a 27-51 record. They’ve also lost seven of their last ten games and are currently 21 games out of first place in the NL West.

• The Astros have another opportunity to claw back into the standings tonight. Houston is already listed as a -255 favorite at home, with a total of 8. However, the over is juiced to -113 for this matchup.

Below, we’ll predict the Rockies vs Astros scores and odds for this game.

The Trade Deadline Is Coming

With one of the worst records in baseball, the Rockies will get plenty of calls from contenders looking for their best-performing players.

The Denver Post has already reported that Ryan McMahon will be off-limits. The Rockies also haven’t held discussions for Cal Quantril, a right-handed pitcher with a 3.50 ERA with Colorado.

We’ll see what the Rockies choose to do. They’ve made mistakes in previous trade deadlines by being quiet and doing nothing. Now they’re in last place and could use more prospects.

Setbacks For Houston’s Starters

The Houston Astros have already been hit with many injuries to their starting rotation. After all, Houston doesn’t have Lance McCullers, Luis Garcia, J.P. France, Justin Verlander, Christian Javier, and Jose Urquidy.

That’s a six-man rotation that is unavailable right now.

The Astros hoped to get J.P. France back from a shoulder injury soon. But he just suffered a setback in his recovery and will need more time to heal.

Meanwhile, Justin Verlander still has a few weeks until he’ll return. You won’t see any MLB scores today with Verlander in the box score. Yet, the Astros are finding a way right now.

Rockies vs Astros Scores and Odds For Game 1:

RL: Astros -1.5 (-130) ML: Astros -280, O/U: 8 -115/-105

Austin Gomber will get the ball for Colorado’s first game of the two-game series. Gomber is a lefty with a 4.36 ERA. While he’s had some good moments this season, the last 30 days haven’t been kind. The lefty has allowed a .289 ISO and wOBA of .447 to his previous 84 batters.

Additionally, Gomber has earned 13.1% of strikeouts and induced 33.3% of ground balls in the last 30 days. He’s also allowed 31.8% of line drives and 28.8% of fly balls and has struggled against both sides of the plate, including lefties, over the last month.

He’ll take on an Astros lineup that hasn’t produced consistently against lefties. With their projected lineup, the Astros have only hit a .140 ISO and wOBA of .272 against lefties over the last 30 days. With that said, the Astros have limited strikeouts to 15.8% and only have two batters who have struck out more than 20% of the time against lefties in the last month.

Houston should put the ball in play. When you do that, good things happen.

Alex Bregman and Yordan Alvarez ultimately lead the charge with high ISO and wOBA numbers. The Astros are also aggressive at the plate against lefties and likely won’t work many walks against Gomber. But again, Houston should add more hard-hit balls than they’re used to against lefties.

Meanwhile, Hunter Brown has done a complete 360. Brown still has a 4.72 ERA, but he’s been terrific over the last month. In the previous 30 days, the right-handed pitcher for the Astros has earned nearly 32% of strikeouts with a .098 ISO and wOBA of .250. Brown has induced over 55% of ground balls and has allowed just 12.2% of line drives.

His play over the last month is one reason the Astros are heavy favorites at home tonight.

He’ll be in line to face a Rockies lineup that has hit a .156 ISO and wOBA of .323. While Colorado has more power bats than the Astros, the Rockies have stuck out nearly 25% of the time against righties over the last 30 days using their projected MLB lineups.

Brown should rack up strikeouts against the Rockies and will likely out-pitch Gomber in tonight’s showdown. After looking through the Rockies vs Astros scores and odds, Let’s back the Astros at -1.5 (-130) for Game 1 of this series.

For MLB expert picks, betting analysis, and more, visit Point Spreads Sports Magazine

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