The San Francisco Giants (57-38) are winless since the All-Star break, losing five straight after closing out the first half of the year on a four-game winning streak.
Despite just getting swept by the Boston Red Sox, the Giants are listed as small -115 betting favorites (wager $115 to win $100) to end their skid at sportsbooks monitored by Odds Shark when they visit the New York Yankees (48-47) in the first of three games Friday.
Fortunately for San Francisco, ace Madison Bumgarner (10-5, 2.12 ERA) will make his second start of the second half and try to rebound from a road loss to the San Diego Padres last Friday. In that game, Bumgarner surrendered four runs and seven hits in six innings of a 4-1 setback with one walk and nine strikeouts.
This came after he allowed only one hit in a complete-game shutout of the Arizona Diamondbacks on July 10.
The Yankees just took three of four games from the Baltimore Orioles at home and remain over the .500 mark despite losing 4-1 on Thursday. They will counter Bumgarner with their top pitcher Masahiro Tanaka (7-2, 3.15) and have won six in a row with him on the hill.
Tanaka pitched last Sunday against the Boston Red Sox and gave up just one run and three hits in six innings of a 3-1 victory with one walk and seven strikeouts.
The big questions heading into this series are, can the Giants find a way to rebound or will New York continue to play well in hopes of making a run at the playoffs?
San Francisco has lost five of six against American League opponents, according to the Odds Shark MLB Database. Before that the Giants won five of six versus the AL, but they have not faced the Yankees since 2013 when they dropped two of three.
New York has won four of five at home, with the under cashing in the past eight at Yankee Stadium. The under is also 6-2 in the previous eight overall for San Francisco, which has seen the total go over in two straight following a 6-0 run below the number.
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