By Charles Jay
VietBet customers who kept a close eye on the New York Yankees saw that even though they didn’t appear to address the loss of Alex Rodriguez too directly in the off-season, they did shell out a lot of bucks to sign free agents. You couldn’t blame them for being idle. At the same time, there were still some concerns about the depth of the starting rotation. Toward this end, they spent $155 million to sign Japanese phenom Masahiro Tanaka, winning a bidding war to do so.
We can say without much equivocation that based on the results so far, Tanaka has exceeded all expectations. He has to be considered an early front-runner for the American league Cy Young Award, in fact, along with Detroit’s Max Scherzer (who was last year’s winner), Oakland’s Sonny Gray and Scott Kazmir, Toronto’s Mark Buehrle and Seattle’s Felix Hernandez, among a few others. And Tanaka’s presence is even more important for the Yankees with people like Michael Pineda and CC Sabathia absent from the rotation.
On Tuesday night, Tanaka takes the mound for the Yankees against the Chicago Cubs in an interleague contest beginning at 8:05 PM ET at Wrigley Field. In the baseball betting odds that have been placed on this game by the folks at VietBet, the Yankees are decisive favorites on the road:
New York Yankees (Tanaka – R) -165
Chicago Cubs (Hammel – R) +155
Over 8 Runs -115
Under 8 Runs -105
Tanaka is 6-0 this season, and that is even more astounding when you consider that he has not lost a game at all since August 2012. Keep in mind that he was 24-0 in his final year in Japan before declaring his intention to go to the States. So if you backtrack, you will see that he has won 33 consecutive decisions.
Tanaka has yielded just seven walks in his 58 innings of activity, and has averaged more than a strikeout an inning (66). His WHIP ratio of 0.91 is one of the best in the major leagues. His last outing may have been his best, as he went the distance in pitching a four-hit shutout against the New York Mets in the latest revival of the “Subway Series.” As some VietBet customers are aware, this is the first occasion upon which Tanaka will be facing a major league opponent for a second time, as he previous appeared at Yankee Stadium against the Cubs on April 16, shutting them down over eight scoreless innings and allowing just two hits, which both came on bunts. Come to think of it, THAT may have been his best game yet.
Conscientious baseball bettors know that it usually helps for a team to get a second look at a pitcher, so the question exists as to what the Cubs may have learned from that first experience. After all, they hardly got the bat on the ball in the first meeting, and they know full well that this guy can go the full route if he has to. And up in the front office, they are perhaps playing a game of “what might have been” as VietBet patrons know that the Cubs had their hearts set on signing the Japanese right-hander but fell one year short on the contract offer.
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