Dylan Cease gives Toronto Blue Jays a clear edge as Luis Castillo struggles at home for Seatt

I've been discussing luck quite a bit when it comes to baseball betting this season. I've been on the bad side of it multiple times this year. However, it is starting to come back in my favor. Yesterday I took the Braves through five innings. They lost the game 11-5. They also allowed three first-inning runs to the Cardinals. Then, in the bottom of the first, they got five off of Cardinals starter Dustin May. No runs were scored for the remaining four innings. I'll take it after the rough stretch from last week.

The Toronto Blue Jays are probably also on the bad end of some bad luck this season. None of their stats are all that poor; they just don't seem to be on the bad side of some injuries. It really is hard to point out where the biggest shortcomings of the Blue Jays actually are. They are five games under .500, which is obviously not where they want to be at this point if they hope to make a return push to the World Series. Toronto is just 2-3 over their past five games as well. The good news for them is that their general manager tends to be aggressive, so if they have a move to make, I think they will pursue it.

Tonight, they use a symbol of that aggressive move, sending out Dylan Cease to the hill. Cease came over as a free agent in the offseason, and he has been a solid addition to the rotation. For the season, Cease is 4-4 with a 3.02 ERA and a 1.24 WHIP. He has been slightly worse on the road than he has been at home, but it really isn't terrible - a 3.34 ERA. The main problem is that he's been a bit inconsistent. He will allow one or two runs, then four or five in another start. The Seattle Mariners are just 13-for-52 for their careers against Cease, with Josh Naylor having half of the hits and at-bats.

The Seattle Mariners were one of the teams that most people picked to win the World Series, or at least make a deep run into the playoffs. Right now, they have just as good a chance of winning the American League West as they do to miss the playoffs altogether. They are just 45-43 for the year, but have been solid at home. As I mentioned with Toronto, the Mariners are likely to be very aggressive at the trade deadline to help get them in a better spot. They also have strong statistics, but their batting average is just .232. Perhaps adding a bat will be important to the club, but I'm not really sure what position they can upgrade.

They may have to figure out if today's starter is one they need to leave out of any sort of postseason rotation or roster. Luis Castillo has struggled to a 3-6 record with a 4.93 ERA and a 1.36 WHIP. He has been even worse with a 5.68 home ERA, compared to a 4.40 road ERA. To make matters worse, he is throwing to a 5.60 ERA at night. June was his best month of the season, and his monthly ERA has gone down each month, but he is still allowing a lot of runs. The Blue Jays are decent enough, but not very successful against the Mariners, batting .220 against him.

These two teams met in the American League Championship Series last year, and both of them are very good. This season has to be a big disappointment for both teams, but there is still time to turn it around. What I think is crazy is that with these offenses, they are averaging just about four runs per game. They rank 24th and 25th in the league in runs scored. It doesn't make much sense.

Tonight does seem like the night for the Blue Jays based on the starting pitching matchup. The Blue Jays are -126 favorites in tonight's game with one of their best pitcher's on the mound. Luis Castillo has struggled at home, but he does seem to be at least getting into better form. I think I'll split a unit on the Blue Jays to win and then the over seven runs. That total is based more on how the run production has been and the names of the starters than on today's reality.

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