The Texas Rangers turned heads when they decided to sign free agent Roy Oswalt to finish the season on their pitching staff. After all, with so many capable arms in the starting rotation and in the bullpen, was there really any need to add the 34-year old, three-time All-Star to the lineup? Oswalt rewarded the Rangers’ faith in him with an excellent performance in his debut for Texas, allowing just one earned run over 6.2 innings and throwing six strikeouts in a 4-1 win over the Colorado Rockies. His second game in a Rangers’ uniform wasn’t so pretty, with Oswalt giving up five earned runs on 13 hits over 6.0 innings, but he was once again awarded the win to improve to 2-0 with a 4.26 ERA. Which side of Oswalt we will see more throughout the remainder of the season will be an interesting story, but after watching the Texas offense bail him out in Wednesday night’s win, the online baseball betting fact is that this Rangers’ team is downright dangerous.
David Murphy went 4-for-5 with two home runs and matched his career-high with five RBI on the night to help Oswalt get the win, but he wasn’t carrying the load on his own either. Ian Kinsler blasted a two-run home run and Adrian Beltre finished the game with three hits and an RBI, as the Rangers’ top-ranked offense came alive against a Detroit Tigers’ team that it was expected to contend with in a possible American League Championship Series this 5Dimes season. Murphy’s three-run homer in the second capped a four-run inning for a Texas offense that got the job done from the outset, and a solo shot in the fourth started another four-run inning. The depth in the Rangers’ order completely masked that Josh Hamilton went 0-for-4 with four strikeouts, a rare occasion where the MVP candidate actually wasn’t part of the pay head show.
A quick look at the numbers show the disparity between the Texas offense in comparison with the rest of the league, as the Rangers rank first in the majors in runs scored, batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage. Beltre’s .333 average is a team-high, while Hamilton and Elvis Andrus are also batting over .300 on the season. No other hitter in the Rangers’ lineup is close to Hamilton in terms of his 24 home runs, but Beltre, Mike Napoli, Nelson Cruz, and Mitch Moreland have already reached double-digits in that category. For as good as the offense has been, the pitching hasn’t been that bad either ranking 10th in combined ERA. Matt Harrison and Yu Darvish have already reached 10 wins, and both joining Colby Lewis among the starters that have kept their ERA under 4.00. With such a powerful offense, the Rangers won’t always need dominant pitching performances to win games. However, the fact that Texas has the arms to rival some of the best in the majors, including the addition of Oswalt, makes them the most complete team in online MLB betting right now.
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