Gambling and sports go hand in hand like peanut butter and jelly. I would be willing to bet (if you excuse the pun) that a lot of the people who go to a casino online will also be a sports fan. Its something about the risk and high stakes that just draws them to the two past times. And fantasy sports is just the perfect combination of these things. Daily fantasy sports are a sort of gambling, but they’ve made it fun and if you do your homework you can do it without losing your shirt in the process. The garden variety betting on games gambling just doesn’t make sense to me for baseball. With 162 games on the docket, there is just too much unpredictability for my taste, instead if you have a taste for gambling, perhaps with odds that are more in your favor, you may enjoy sites such as Aio Bet and others. The Dodgers and Mets was supposed to be a marquee matchup between Julio Arias and Jacob DeGrom. DeGrom pitched very well, but didn’t get the win because Jeurys Familia gave up four runs in the ninth inning. Arias surrendered three runs in two and two thirds of an inning. So much for the hype.

Last night, we saw Jackie Bradley Jr.’s 29 game hit streak come to an end, but another Red Sox is right on his heels. Xander Bogaerts now has a 20 game streak going himself. Unlike Bradley, Bogaerts came into the season as one of the top shortstops on the board and now he leads the American League in hits. He is hitting .345 on the season to lead the Red Sox in batting average. That’s saying something with Bradley hitting .341.

If you read anything

One of the things I love about baseball is that performance becomes very predictable over time. On any given day, any given hitter or pitcher can rise to the top. Over time, the cream always rises to the top. Josh Donaldson hasn’t had a great season so far, but on Friday night he was on his game. He ended up going four for five with two runs and five RBI. His average (.257) may not be brilliant, but he has 13 home runs and 29 RBI on the season. Edwin Encarnacion is also struggling some, but he also has 36 RBI on the season. You can’t keep good hitters down forever.

We kind of expected

It’s hard to declare a winner on any deal, but when the Orioles traded Steve Clevenger for Mark Trumbo it looked like a one-sided trade. It was. Trumbo hit his 15^th home run of the season to go along with 34 RBI. The bigger surprise might be the fact that he is hitting a robust .284. That average may not blow your skirt up, but it is certainly better than recent seasons. We shouldn’t be that surprised though because he was a perennial 30 home run threat the last time he spent a full season in the American League.

We didn’t expect

Stephen Piscotty hit a rare grand slam off of Max Scherzer on Friday night. He surrendered five runs in seven innings and while some starters would be satisfied with such an effort, Scherzer hasn’t given up five runs in a start since early May. He’s done it three times this season (also giving up seven runs in a start in April) as his ERA ballooned up to 4.05. That’s not terrible, but it’s also pretty high for a preseason favorite for the Cy Young award.

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• Wade Davis (converted #13)
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