In today’s SportSense Entertainment Newsletter…

There were plenty of predictions to go around yesterday across the MLB, with our model focusing in on one of those predictions and making it a 3-star play. That prediction went 0-1 overall, and you can see how the rest of the model performed below.

Money Line Predictions: 5-5

Over/Under Predictions: 3-7

Run Line Predictions: 4-6

3-star Predictions: 0-1

🦁 Detroit Lions sign Teddy Bridgewater. The Detroit Lions added another quarterback to the roster on Monday, signing free agent Teddy Bridgewater following his visit to Detroit last month, per Ian Rapoport. The Lions will be Bridgewater’s sixth NFL franchise, with the 30-year-old suiting up for the Minnesota Vikings, Carolina Panthers, Denver Broncos, New Orleans Saints, and most recently the Miami Dolphins. Bridgewater has tallied 15,120 yards and 75 touchdowns in his career, giving Detroit a solid option behind Jared Goff.

✈️ Kareem Hunt takes visit to New Orleans. Free agent running back Kareem Hunt is set make a trip to New Orleans to visit the Saints in the near future. The visit comes after the NFL handed current Saints running back Alvin Kamara a three-game suspension, one that resulted from an alleged assault charge outside of a Las Vegas casino 2022. Hunt, who spent the last four seasons as a member of the Cleveland Browns, is coming off a season in which he averaged a career-low 3.8 yards per carry, and if signed will compete with Jamaal Williams and Kendre Miller for touches.

🪑 Brock Purdy expected to sit out of preseason opener. San Francisco 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy has made a great impression at training camp, but it appears that the second-year pro will sit on the sidelines to begin the preseason. “I doubt Brock plays”, 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan told reporters on Monday, signaling that all the reps will go to the other QBs on the roster. San Francisco has a big decision to make at the QB position this season, with Purdy, Trey Lance, and Sam Darnold all fighting for the No.1 spot.

There are 16 MLB games scheduled to take place throughout this afternoon and evening. However, due to lines being unavailable at the time the model was run and our model only predicting the first game of a doubleheader, our model has predictions for 14 of today’s matchups.

Los Angeles Dodgers @ Arizona Diamondbacks

Model Predicts- Dodgers ML, OVER 9, Dodgers -1.5

The Los Angeles Dodgers will travel to the desert to take on an NL West rival in the Arizona Diamondbacks on Tuesday.

The Dodgers are one of the hottest teams in baseball at the moment, winning seven of their last ten games following a 13-7 win over San Diego on Monday afternoon. Meanwhile, Arizona enters today’s matchup having lost six straight games and sits nine games back of L.A. in the standings.

Los Angeles and Arizona are on the opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes finding the win column, and our model thinks that will stay the case tonight. Will we see the Dodgers back up the model’s prediction, or can Arizona find its way out of a massive slump?

Los Angeles Dodgers

The Los Angeles Dodgers quickly found themselves down 5-0 yesterday against the San Diego Padres, but L.A. would pile on eight runs in the fourth inning alone on its way to a massive 13-7 victory.

According to FanGraphs, Los Angeles posted a stellar .406 BABIP in that matchup to go along with a 15.6% strikeout rate. Numbers like that have been the norm for the Dodgers over the last few weeks, with the team’s BABIP and wRC+ coming in at .307 and 131, respectively, since July 1st.

Los Angeles is lucky the offense has been red hot at the plate over the last month, because the starting pitching has been far from excellent in that same timeframe.

We’ve seen the Dodgers’ starting pitching staff post an abysmal 5.47 ERA since July 1st, the third lowest mark in the major leagues. The group also owns a 4.59 xFIP and 38.6% ground ball rate, showing that opposing hitters are sizing up everyone in the starting rotation and keeping baseball’s in the air.

Things likely won’t get much better tonight with Julio Urías (8-6 record, 4.69 ER) set to get the start on the mound. Urías’ 4.00 xERA shows that some positive regression could be on its way for an otherwise down season, but his struggles on the road are hard to ignore. Per FanGraphs, the left-hander owns an eye-popping 7.88 ERA and 5.71 xFIP on the road this season, compared to 2.22 and 3.22, respectively, at home.

Arizona Diamondbacks

Not too long ago we saw the Arizona Diamondbacks at the top of the AL West and beginning to create some separation from its division rivals. However, Arizona has yet to win a game in August and is now 8-22 in its last 30 games.

A sudden cold spell at the plate has been the largest contributor to the downfall. Arizona owns the fifth-lowest wRC+ (83), BABIP (.272), and home run total (29) since July 1st, and in that same span of time ranks in the bottom half of the MLB in Hard Hit rate (33.7%). This team is oftentimes generating soft contact and failing to get the ball in the air, hurting any chances Arizona had of scoring runs in bunches.

The offense has been even worse once you narrow the timeline to the month of August, a month where Arizona has seen its wRC+ plummet to 62. Despite just a 17.7% strikeout rate this month, the Diamondbacks have seen their BABIP drop to .262 as well, further signaling this offense may still be quite a ways away from rock bottom.

Brandon Pfaadt (0-5 record, 7.11 ERA) will get the start on the mound today in hopes that his offense can provide some run support. We saw last week why Pfaadt is a highly regarded prospect with his 7.0 inning and one hit performance against the Giants, but the rookie still has his shortcomings. The right-hander ranks in the bottom 10% of the MLB in Hard Hit rate (45.1%) and Barrel rate (11.8%), and is only striking out 19% of opposing hitters.

What’s the Play?

Even though the high temperature in Phoenix, Arizona will be 108 degrees today, the Diamondbacks enter this crucial series as the coldest team in baseball. That plays a big factor in our model leaning towards Los Angeles, however, we have our eyes set on the over in this one.

Urías is two different pitchers while at home and on the road. The 26-year-old has pitched a total of 17.0 innings across his last four road starts, surrendering 19 earned runs and posting a 1.59 WHIP. He’s clearly no comfortable outside of Dodger stadium, and even a cold offense like Arizona’s has a shot at creating a spark against him.

Pfaadt is a little more unpredictable in his first season, but his vulnerability to barrel contact and low strikeout rate make the Dodgers a tough matchup. Our model gives the over a 55.80% chance to hit, implying odds of -126, so we’ll take the slight edge on the over at -120.

3-star play: Over 9 (-120)

Money Line Trends 💰

• Minnesota Twins- 60-54 overall this season, 5-0 in last five games

• Atlanta Braves- 70-40 overall this season, 33-20 as the away team

• Toronto Blue Jays- 64-50 overall this season, 34-26 as the away team

Over/Under Trends ⬆️⬇️

• Baltimore Orioles- Over is 56-48-8 this season, 27-26-3 as home team

• New York Mets- Under is 61-47-4 this season, 32-16-2 as the home team

• Los Angeles Dodgers- Over is 66-39-6 this season, 37-17-3 as the road team

Run Line Trends ➕➖

• Cincinnati Reds- Run line is 72-43 overall this season, 25-13 as a home underdog

• Baltimore Orioles- Run line is 69-43 overall this season, 9-5 as a home underdog

Various injuries around the league. See full injury report at MLB.com.

🥊 Tim Anderson, Jose Ramirez receive suspensions after brawl. Chicago White Sox shortstop Tim Anderson and Cleveland Guardians third baseman got into quite the scuffle over the weekend, resulting in suspensions for both players. The fight began after Ramirez was tagged by Anderson, resulting in a a verbal exchange before Ramirez hit Anderson in the jaw with a right hook, sending Anderson to the dirt. Both benches cleared as the brawl caused a 15 minute delay in the game, and Ramirez will now be riding the pine for three games while Anderson will be out for six.

🤕 Hyun Jin Ryu from game while throwing no-hitter. Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Hyun Jin Ryu was in the midst of tossing a no-hitter on Monday night in what was just his second start of the season. However, a line drive off the bat of Oscar Gonzalez ended the left-hander’s night prematurely, the second one that hit hi in the game. Hyun Jin Ryu left the field under his own power, but was later diagnosed with a right knee contusion following Toronto’s 3-1 victory over the Guardians.

👀 ACC looking into adding Cal and Stanford. The Atlantic Coast Conference is exploring the idea of adding two West Coast teams into the mix as the Pac-12 holds on for dear life. Per ESPN’s Pete Thamel, the ACC will hold two conference calls with the schools about joining the conference, calls that will include league athletic directors, presidents and chancellors. Cal, Stanford, Oregon State, and Washington State are the only four teams that remain in the Pac-12, and the schools reportedly have a “myriad” of options when it comes to what conference they will call home in the future.

🦆 Ducks sign Alex Stalock to one-year deal. The Anaheim Ducks made an addition in net on Monday, signing goaltender Alex Stalock to a one-year, $800,000 deal. The 36-year-old, who was selected in the fourth round of the 2005 NHL Draft, enjoyed a decent season with the Chicago Blackhawks in 2022-23, posting a .908 save percentage across 27 appearances. Injuries and heart inflammation have kept Stalock on the sidelines for much of the last few seasons, but he appears to be fully healthy and will now compete with John Gibson and Lukas Dostal for time in net.

🏀 NBA win totals posted on several sportsbooks. With the NBA providing zero excitement in the month of August, oddsmakers gave us some hop for the upcoming season by releasing team win totals on Monday. DraftKings Sportsbook has the Denver Nuggets over/under for wins set at 54.5 (+100), with the Boston Celtics and Milwaukee Bucks right on their heels at 53.5 (-135) and 52.5 (-120), respectively. Meanwhile, the San Antonio SPurs (29.5), Detroit Pistons (27.5), and Washington Wizards (24.5) round out the bottom three totals for the 2023-24 regular season.

Today’s trivia requires you to know a thing or two about nicknames. We’ve given you the nicknames of five NFL players, past and current, and it is your job to guess as many as possible.

As always, answers are provided at the end of the newsletter.

1. Beast Mode

2. Big Play Slay

3. Pacman

4. Red Rifle

5. The Bus

Anyone know what has happened on August 8th throughout history? We didn’t have a clue either, but it appears that it has been a busy day.

On August 8th…

1992- The original United States “Dream Team” wins the gold medal at the Barcelona Olympics. A team that featured NBA legends Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, and Scottie Pippen and many others, the Dream Team defeated their opponents by an average of 43.8 points per game, the second-largest point differential in Olympic history. The gold medal match was won by a score of 117-85 against Croatia, the lowest margin of victory the United States had at the Olympics.

1997- Seattle Mariners pitcher Randy Johnson strikes out 19 batters in a 5-0 over the Chicago White Sox. Johnson would throw an incredible 148 pitches across nine innings, allowing just five hits and three walks while on his way to his 16th win of the season. It was the second time in less than two months that Johnson recorded 19 punch outs in a game, which currently ranks second in MLB history for the most in a single game.

2004- Former NFL quarterback John Elway is inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Selected with the No.1 overall pick in the 1983 NFL Draft out of Stanford, Elway played his entire professional career with the Denver Broncos, winning two Super Bowls, one MVP award, and earning nine Pro Bowl selections. He would go on to finish his career with 51,475 passing yards and 300 touchdown passes, ranking him in the top-15 in NFL history in both categories.

1. Marshawn Lynch

2. Darius Slay

3. Adam Jones

4. Andy Dalton

5. Jerome Bettis