Betting on baseball is all about knowing who's hot and who's not.
Dimers.com contributor Tony Bellissimo tours both camps in the Wednesday June 29, 2022 edition of Who's Hot and Who's Not in the MLB right now.
Second place isn’t anything to brag about when you’re 10 games out of first in the AL West and still one game under .500, but the Texas Rangers are playing quality baseball as of late and finally getting healthy.
With a blowout of Kansas City last night, the Rangers won for the 7th time in 11 games and will look to get to .500 with another win over the Royals. The way the Texas offense is going, look for it to happen.
The Kansas City Royals will turn to Zach Grienke on Wednesday afternoon to try to snap a four-game slide that’s seen the pitching staff allow 32 runs.
The Royals are now 21 games under .500 and likely to trade Grienke and maybe some other attractive veterans after shipping Carlos Santana to Seattle earlier this week. Shortstop Bobby Witt and rookie first baseman Vinnie Pasquantino (18 homers in 69 AAA games this year) represent the future, which is now.
Dansby Swanson had a horribly slow start to the season. He had no homers and 2 RBIs through 15 games and was toiling at the bottom of Atlanta’s lineup following a big 2021 campaign that saw him register career highs in homers (27) and RBIs (88.)
Sizzling since early June, Swanson is a daily must-use. He has 13 homers, 43 RBIs, 11 steals and by far his best career batting average at .299. The Braves face Philadelphia’s Ranger Suarez on Wednesday night.
Getting a little long in the tooth and perhaps it’s showing in the numbers, Houston’s Yuli Gurriel is struggling thus far this season but managed to homer in Tuesday’s win over the Mets. Now 38, Gurriel had a career year in 2019 with 31 homers and 104 RBIs, and was solid again last season with 15 homers, 81 RBIs and a .319 batting average.
However, he’s in a funk right now though he hasn’t hurt the team’s success. Gurriel has only 6 homers, 21 RBIs and a .228 average heading into tonight’s matchup against Taijuan Walker.