A solid 1-1 night with my free selections last night as my Astros couldn’t avoid that big inning against them in blowing their 4-1 lead and the Jaguars held the lead until late in the 4th quarter but still managed to cover the spread. Action is heating up this weekend with Week 2 of the NFL preseason getting going, a full slate of MLB games and even a little CFL action tonight. Let’s get right to the free plays.

All lines taken from Pinnacle Sports with bet amounts ‘to win’ on favorites and flat on underdogs

Play of the Day in Bold

MLB Pre-All Star Break: 101-107-13 (+$691)

MLB Post-All Star Break: 21-23 (+$620)

CFL YTD: 5-6 (+$34)

NFL-X YTD: 1-1 (+$90)

MLB Plays

NYY/Tampa Over 7 (+112) $300 to win $336

Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner called out his team on Wednesday for not producing with the bats and scoring runs. New York is falling fast in both the wildcard and AL East races and with all the high priced talent they’ve got in their lineup it’s only a matter of time before they start to get it going. New York is 3-0-1 O/U in their last four road games and are also 3-0-1 O/U in their last four against a division opponent. The day off on Thursday was very much needed for this team as they will begin their final push towards the playoffs tonight.

Tampa finished a 10-game road trip yesterday with a win in Texas as they took three of four from the Rangers. In those three wins the Rays scored 6, 7 and 10 runs as the entire lineup is seeing the ball well at the moment and cashing in on their opportunities. The Rays are 9-4 O/U when Cobb pitches Game 1 of a series and they are 25-9-2 O/U the last 36 times they’ve been a home favorite of -150 or less. With Cobb on the hill in those games they are 5-2 O/U and I believe we see both offenses come to the forefront tonight. With nearly 90% of bettors thinking that the Yankees offensive struggles will continue, I have no problem taking the plus-money and being in the minority here.

NFL-X plays

San Diego/Seattle Under 38.5 (-108) $216 to win $200

With a Week 2 game between these two teams looming, I doubt we see anything but a “vanilla” game called on both sides. These two teams don’t want to put anything on film that the other can use against them in Week 2 and that means a very basic gameplan has been installed for this meaningless preseason game and the quicker it comes to a conclusion the happier the Chargers and Seahawks will be.

CFL Plays

Ottawa +7 (bought the hook) (-120) $240 to win $200

Some other shops have the +7 already out there, but if you can only find the +6.5 I’d suggest buying this one up to 7.

We’ve got a 5-1 Edmonton team in town to take on the 1-5 Redblacks and to no one’s surprise the road favorite is getting plenty of love here. However, I believe Ottawa has a chance to win this game outright against a napping Edmonton team because it hasn’t been a fun week of travel for the Eskimos. Last week they were in Montreal to beat up on the Alouettes, flew home for the week of practice and are now back out east to take on Ottawa. That’s not exactly the most friendly travel schedule for this team and it could cost them tonight.

Secondly, this is a revenge spot for Ottawa after they lost 27-11 out in Edmonton in early July. Edmonton was laying -5 that day (at home) and with some different fortunes for both teams since then they are up to -7! I’ll take the extra points all day in a spot like this as the chances Ottawa collapses in the 2nd half again (outscored 25-4) are dim with it being a home game for this team. The Redblacks actually went into halftime with the lead in that game and this time I believe they’ll end up finishing the game with the lead. I’m being cautious and taking the points though as you never know what could happen late in a game, but if you were already having thoughts of taking the +235 ML with Ottawa I wouldn’t be shy to fire.