Article courtesy OddsShark (@OddsShark)
The San Diego Padres locked up rising star shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr. for more than a decade on Monday, signing the 22-year-old to a 14-year contract extension worth $340 million. Tatis is hoping he will help the Padres supplant the Los Angeles Dodgers as the National League West champions as early as this year, and they are the only team in the division with a chance to do so based on their current odds at sportsbooks monitored by OddsShark.com.
San Diego is listed as the +200 second choice (wager $100 to win $200) behind a Los Angeles team that is a solid -260 favorite (bet $260 to win $100) on the NL West division odds as it looks to take home its ninth consecutive NL West title in 2021.
Bolstered by a much-improved starting rotation featuring new additions Yu Darvish and Blake Snell, the Padres figure to at least give the defending champs some fits. However, the other three teams in the division have virtually no shot to unseat the Dodgers, and the betting odds certainly reflect that.
The Arizona Diamondbacks and San Francisco Giants are next behind them at +5000 followed by the Colorado Rockies at +6600 at sports betting sites.
The Giants were the last team other than the Dodgers to win the NL West, and they also went on to sweep their way to the World Series championship the same year back in 2012. San Francisco is obviously a much different team now though, and competing with the likes of Los Angeles and San Diego will be an extremely tough task again this year. The same can be said for Arizona and Colorado.
The Rockies are the longest shots on the board for good reason. Not only did they finish only one game ahead of the Diamondbacks in the standings last season at 26-34 — 17 games behind the Dodgers for the division lead — but they also traded away their best player to the St. Louis Cardinals and saw outfielder Ian Desmond opt out for the second straight year over the weekend.
Desmond hit 20 home runs in 140 games in 2019, and All-Star third baseman Nolan Arenado went to the Cardinals in a blockbuster deal to kick off the month of February.
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