Thanks again, 312!
Let’s keep rollin’!
2-1 yesterday, 102-84 season. PW went 1-1(57-43 season) while BP went 1-0(57-46 season).
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Caleb Wilfinger
Los Angeles Dodgers vs St Louis Cardinals: YRFI (-120)
Anytime that Noah Syndergaard is on the mound these days, I’ll be looking to target the YRFI. The Dodgers starter has had a very poor start to his tenure in Los Angeles with a 5.94 ERA in 8 starts. His numbers show that there is hope for some positive regression, but Syndergaard is still a below-average starter. He hasn’t missed many bats over the first 2 months of the season and I expect that to continue against St. Louis.
Even if the Cardinals are unable to get on the board against Syndergaard, the Dodgers have a solid chance of pushing across a run against Miles Mikolas. The right-hander has allowed a first-inning run in 5 of his last 9 outings this season, as he has typically struggled out of the gate. Mikolas’ 5.75 xERA and poor advanced metrics across the board don’t grade out well among all qualified pitchers, per Baseball Savant. Now against a Dodgers lineup that has seen some success against him previously, I expect Mikolas to stumble out of the gate once again in St. Louis.
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Baltimore Orioles vs Toronto Blue Jays: YRFI (-120)
For our second pick in this market for Saturday, I’m targeting a game between a couple of struggling pitchers and strong offenses. The Orioles and Blue Jays are two of the best teams in the American League and both teams are driven by their offenses. Toronto’s top of the lineup should see success against Grayson Rodriguez, who has terrific stuff but holds a 6.57 ERA and ranks in the bottom 4 percentile of all qualified pitchers in hard-hit rate. On the other side, the Blue Jays are countering with Alek Manoah, who is coming off a pair of poor outings, allowing a combined 8 runs in 8.2 IP. Furthermore, his season-long metrics still reveal an xERA of 7.00, so there is reason to be skeptical about Manoah’s effectiveness in this start. I’ll take the YRFI at this price.
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Kurt Blakeway
Boston Red Sox vs. San Diego Padres
Pitching matchup: Chris Sale vs. Joe Musgrove
Joe Musgrove has struggled since coming back from his injury. Over his first starts, he is 1-1 with a 6.63 ERA. Musgrove has given four home runs and allowed eight walks in those starts. If he is going to have any success moving forward, he can’t be giving away free bases at that rate.
To Musgrove’s defense, all four games he has started were against division foes. Not that should be used as an excuse, but the familiarity those teams have with him doesn’t help. Today he is going against a Red Sox team with only one player with more than ten at-bats, Justin Turner.
As for Chris Sale, he has pitched better than his 5.40 ERA indicates. Sale has posted a 3.73 xERA and 3.49 xFIP, which shows his ERA is a bit inflated, and he has been a bit unlucky.
Only Xander Bogaerts and Nelson Cruz have double-digit at-bats against Sale, in which both are hitting over .300. Lucky for us, we only got through one inning.
Bet: NRFI -140
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Cleveland Guardians vs. New York Mets
Pitching matchup: Tanner Bibee vs. Max Scherzer
These two teams have one major thing in common; they can’t hit consistently. This looks like a bad take, as they combined to score 19 runs on 23 hits last night. But both teams rank in the bottom 10 in runs per game (CLE 3.61 NYM 4.35) and are below average in most hitting categories.
Cleveland’s Offensive Ranks
AVG: 25th
wOBA: 30th
wRC+: 30th
SLG%: 30th
New York’s Offensive Ranks
AVG: 20th
wOBA: 16th
wRC+: 13th
SLG%: 19th
With the Mets’ offense a bit better than the Guardians, it’s nice to know that Tanner Bibee has a very low HardHit% (33.3%) and Barrel% (6.7%). Even if/when the Mets make contact, it’s safe to assume it shouldn’t cause too much damage, at least, we hope.
Bet: NRFI -120