Article courtesy OddsShark (@OddsShark)
Coming off just their second loss of the season, the Los Angeles Dodgers (5-2) will finally play their first home series in 2021 starting on Friday when they host the Washington Nationals (1-2) as heavy favorites at sportsbooks monitored by OddsShark.com. In fact, the Dodgers are up as high as -300 favorites for the series opener after opening at -245 against the Nationals.
While Los Angeles has again been one of baseball’s best teams to begin the season, the defending World Series champions have not been unbeatable, losing once in each series so far. The Dodgers are coming off a 4-3 setback to the Oakland Athletics as -156 road favorites on Wednesday after winning the first two games of the series by a combined score of 15-4.
Nationals vs. Dodgers | OddsShark Matchup Report
Meanwhile, Washington has gotten off to a rough start, playing just one series to date versus the Atlanta Braves due to COVID-19 issues. The Nationals won their opener 6-5 on Tuesday before losing the last two games, including a 2-0 defeat as -142 home favorites at sports betting sites in the finale of a doubleheader on Wednesday. Unfortunately for them, they will have a tough time matching up with starting rotations in this series until ace Max Scherzer takes the mound, which is expected to be in the finale.
Scherzer (0-0, 6.00 ERA) started Washington’s lone victory and went six solid innings, allowing four runs – all on solo home runs – and five hits total with no walks and nine strikeouts. He has gone 5-4 with a 2.76 ERA in 14 career games against Los Angeles, including 12 starts. The three-time Cy Young Award winner is lined up for Sunday opposite Dodgers projected starter Dustin May (1-0, 0.00 ERA).
Fortunately for the Nationals, they will get to avoid the two former Cy Young winners for the Dodgers in Clayton Kershaw and Trevor Bauer. Instead, Washington’s Joe Ross (4-4, 5.48 ERA in 2019) will face Walker Buehler (0-0, 3.00 ERA this year) in the opener, and then Julio Urias (1-0, 1.29 ERA) will get the call for Los Angeles on Saturday against a still unnamed starter for the visitors.
This will be the first meeting between the teams since 2019 when the Nationals defeated the Dodgers in the National League Division Series en route to winning their first World Series title. Going back to 2016, Los Angeles has won 18 of the past 30 meetings, according to the OddsShark MLB Database. The UNDER has gone 16-12-2 over that same stretch.
Check out OddsShark on Twitter and Instagram or head to YouTube for analysis on this week’s top games. As well, the OddsShark Computer serves up daily MLB picks for bettors.
