This is going to be a four-unit play: Two on the moneyline and two on the -1.5 runline.
Cole Ragans will be making his Major League debut tonight for the Rangers, and this is going to be a tough spot for him. Ragans only made eight Triple-A starts before getting his call-up to the big leagues. Less than 13 months ago, Ragans was pitching for the Single-A Hickory Crawdads. He's looking at a pretty steep jump in class tonight.
Ragans is a lefty, and few teams hit lefties better than the White Sox. Chicago is hitting .279 against left-hand pitching this season (No. 1 in MLB), with a .340 on-base percentage (No. 2), a .772 OPS (No. 4) and a 120 wRC+ (No. 3).
White Sox starter Johnny Cueto has a 2.12 ERA and a 1.18 WHIP in his last five starts. He's been great away from home this season, posting a 3-1 record with a 1.70 ERA and a 1.08 WHIP in six road starts.
Even if Ragans does have some moderate success against the White Sox a couple times through the order, can they trust the Rangers' bullpen to hold things in the second half of the game? Matt Moore, Jose Leclerc and Jonathan Hernandez each threw 20+ pitches out of the bullpen last night. They gave up five runs on four hits and four walks in 3.0 innings against Baltimore. The night before wasn't much better. Dennis Santana gave up two runs in the ninth inning.
We've got two teams heading in opposite directions. Chicago is 11-6 since July 13 and is only two games out of the AL Central. Texas is 6-13 during that same time frame and just got swept by the short-handed Orioles at home. This is a very affordable price to back the White Sox on Thursday.