Sports Handicapper Scott Rickenbach's Picks & Predictions

MLB Thursday 10* Top Play OVER 9 in Boston Red Sox vs Baltimore Orioles @ 1:35 ET - Action on pitchers. The Orioles and Red Sox, prior to yesterday's surprising 3-1 final, have continued to get involved in wild high-scoring games. I am going action on pitchers here because honestly neither may work deep in this game anyway. Baumann has only made 2 starts out of 11 appearances this season. He is 0-2 with a 5.40 ERA in his 4 road appearances and he is unlikely to work deep here so this is truly more of a bullpen game for the Orioles and we saw how the Red Sox responded against the Baltimore bullpen earlier in this series. The Boston starter here is expected to be Nathan Eovaldi and he is returning from a right shoulder issue. He was not overly impressive in rehab outings. Also, he has a 6.26 ERA with a .322 batting average against in his 8 home starts this season. Prior to yesterday, the Orioles last 5 road games had all totaled at least 9 runs and their last 4 games overall had totaled an average of 18.5 runs apiece! The Red Sox have seen 5 of their last 7 games total at least 9 runs. Also, Boston has scored an average of 9.3 runs per game last 4 home games. They are known for hitting so well at home and even though cooler fall-like weather has started to move in it will be temperate for sure. Just a nice fall afternoon at the ballpark. So we'll take advantage and look for the hitters to rule the day after a rare off-day yesterday for both lineups. 10* OVER 9 in Boston

MLB Thursday Free Pick Philadelphia Phillies Run Line -1.5 -120 @ Chicago Cubs @ 2:20 ET - The Phillies outhit the Cubs 11-6 last night and the Cubs only scored in 1 inning but it was a big one. Chicago got 4 runs in bottom of 5th including a 3-run bomb. Ironically, if Brewers beat out Phillies for final wild card spot in NL, they will have the division rival Cubs to thank as Chicago has won all 5 games against Philadelphia so far. I am going with action on pitchers as I look for a Philadelphia bounce back either way but I will mention that the expected starters are Ranger Suarez and Javier Assad. Suarez is 4-0 with a 2.27 ERA since mid-July. Assad is 0-2 with a 6.35 ERA in his 3 home starts for the Cubs this season. He is off B2B bad starts even though he faced a bad Pirates team and then, prior to that, hosted a Rockies team that is one of the worst in the league on the road. That does not bode well for him tonight against a potent Phillies lineup that is sure to cash in more of their opportunities unlike last night. Philadelphia has had only one losing streak last longer than 4 games since the All Star Break. The Phillies respond big here and win this by a multi-run margin. Free Pick PHILADELPHIA -1.5 -120

NFL Thursday 10* Top Play OVER 47.5 in Cincinnati Bengals vs Miami Dolphins @ 8:15 ET - Statistically the Dolphins are one of the top teams in the league for passing offense but one of the worst in terms of pass defense. That is the perfect set up for an over and we also have beautiful weather expected tonight in Cincinnati so both offenses can have the playbook wide open for this one. Love the fact that the Bengals have had all 3 of their games stay under the total and the Dolphins have had 2 of 3 stay under. This means we have a value spot here and sure enough the posted total has moved a little lower and I already felt it could have been higher. Bengals did not score well in the home loss to Pittsburgh to open up the season but they had 432 yards of offense in that game! Cincinnati will have another big performance in what is just their 2nd home game of the season but this time they will have more points to show for it. Keep in mind the Dolphins just faced a #1 ranked Bills defense and another one of their games was against a Patriots defense that has been solid in terms of yardage allowed this season. The point is that this Miami offense, their passing attack, is legitimate and will put pressure on this Bengals defense but I look for Cincinnati to match them score for score in what should be a wide-open and high-scoring affair. QB Tua Tagovailoa and WR Jaylen Waddle both were on the injury list as questionable but both expected to play here and I think the way they were handled this week is more precautionary than anything else. 10* OVER 47.5 in Cincinnati

CFB Thursday 10* OVER 59.5 in BYU Cougars vs Utah State Aggies @ 8 ET - The Aggies have disappointed so far this season and that is why this total has been dropping. Two key points to that though. Utah State is not going to stop this ultra-dangerous BYU offense. The Aggies have a veteran QB in Logan Bonner who had a fantastic TD-INT ratio coming into this season. He is off a very ugly game against UNLV in terms of turnovers but he will bounce back here. The Aggies will score some points but they are a 24 point dog with good reason here. That said, I love the over in this spot. BYU has seen 3 of their 4 games total more than 60 points this season. The Aggies, other than the game against Alabama of course (yes, Utah State had to face the Crimson Tide this season), have had better yardage in games than points to show for it. I feel that changes here. Utah State will be excited for this big game facing BYU as THE Thursday game this week and they will want to make the most of it. They will score some points as a result but, again, just not stopping a BYU team that has put up some huge numbers statistically on offense other than the tight relatively low-scoring OT win over Baylor. Look for the over to improve to 4-1 in Brigham Young games on the season. Also, I like the fact the weather is very mild and will be great weather for the offenses to fully operate tonight in Provo, Utah. 10* OVER the total in BYU