April Baseball Generates Much Needed Interest
Betting MLB
Major League Baseball usually takes a back seat to the NBA and NHL playoffs during April and May. The NBA first round playoffs are very predictable without any major upsets. The NHL playoffs are much more intense with big surprises and many over-time games. The Chicago Blackhawks getting knocked out by the four game sweep to Nashville is the biggest jolt to the hockey world. It is tough for MLB to compete for viewers and bettors.
However, April baseball has generated much needed interest with surprise teams and hot bats.
It is still only spring baseball with the “boys of summer” just getting started. But the predictions of spring training were not on course with the usual selections on teams and players. Those predictions we heard are very far off course. We did expect the American League East to be a very tight race with the Red Sox, Orioles, Yankees and Blue Jays staying within a few games of each other. The Jays just slumped from day one with no run production and in last place. Playing better ball helps but the competitive division is their biggest problem. April has doomed the Jays to reach any aspirations of a playoff spot.
The National League West is the version of new kids on the block. We did not expect a hot race between the Colorado Rockies and the Arizona Diamondbacks. The usual West division leaders are the Dodgers and Giants. The Dodgers are inconsistent without much impetus and the Giants are just woeful and boring. Colorado and Arizona are now considered legitimate contenders after their performances in April. However, it is a long season and as stated previously, you cannot win a pennant in April but you can certainly lose it.
The top stories of April are beyond the usual pattern of spring baseball and indicates which teams will be headed to post season if they continue their stellar play into the summer. But a few teams can regroup and salvage a dismal April performance and get back in the race.
This team has shown something special and produced much more than expected. The Washington Nationals are pounding other teams with an offense that is a scoring machine. Bryce Harper is back to his MVP form from two years ago, Trea Turner is stimulating the top of lineup, Ryan Zimmerman is leading with his bat and Anthony Rendon exploded with three homers and ten runs batted in a game against the Mets. That final score was 23 to 5. The offensive scored 42 runs the previous week in Colorado in a three game series to sweep the hot Rockies. It was part of their MLB April scoring record of 170 runs. This is a remarkable display for a team whose strength is pitching. When your offensive is scoring at will, your great pitching staff gets more relief support and rest with less pressure to perform. The injury loss of Adam Eaton will be felt, but this team has the balance of hitting and pitching to sail through the National League East and be the odds on favorite to win the World Series.
April baseball reveals a glimpse of how teams perform on the field and not how they look on paper. Perception is a deceptive way of fooling most bettors in April until reality takes hold of all the preconceived notions supported by the MLB future bet propositions listed by the Vegas books. Bettors can easily be swayed by a power of assumption that is speculation and used by the book operators. All the books put their spin on team predictions and they are all the same with a few variations. Nobody goes out on a limb to give bettors new fresh insight on other possibilities. But that is the nature of the business.
