Prime-Time First TD Bets — Monday Night Football, Week 16
Alex Christenson
The MLB Sunday schedule has some interesting matchups. Max Fried faces the Houston Astros offense, red-hot Marcus Stroman faces a not-so-red-hot Dodgers team that is just .500 to start the year, and you have marquee pitchers like Jacob deGrom, Clayton Krshaw and Yu Darvish on the mound.
Make sure to get over to the MLB Bet tracker to see who all of our analysts like in today’s games. You can check out all the models, projections and MLB discord chats by signing up for the free trial of FTNBets here. Here is a sneak peek of my three favorite MLB best bets for Sunday.
Best MLB Strikeout Prop Bets Today
Jacob deGrom under 10.5 strikeouts
Jacob deGrom is one of the best pitchers in baseball. The 4-17 Athletics he faces today are one of the worst teams in baseball. So why am I betting the under on his strikeouts? The Athletics may not be a powerful offense, but they don’t own a high strikeout rate against right-handed pitching this year. The wRC+ score is very low against righties, but they strike out at a league average rate. deGrom is anything but average. He has been one of the most dominant pitchers in baseball for a few years now. The problem is he might not be 100%. His first start of the year they limited him to 73 pitches. His last two starts he was in the 90s, striking out nine and 11 batters. Last game, he threw under 60 pitchers and left early with a wrist issue. He threw this week and says he feels fine, but I would expect the Rangers to be conservative and not let him throw 110 pitches coming off that minor setback. Oakland’s low strikeout rate against righties, coupled with the possibility of less than 90 pitches for deGrom makes a 10+ strikeout game harder to see. I fully expect deGrom to cruise and dominate this lineup when he is on the field, but asking for 11 strikeouts fresh off a start that was cut short feels like a risk not worth taking.
Cleveland Guardians over 0.5 strikeouts thrown in the first inning
This is a fun bet here. I have not seen a book hang a strikeout number yet for the young prospect Logan Allen. Allen has 20 strikeouts through three starts over 14.1 innings against AAA competition. He had almost 1.5 strikeouts per inning last season, as he spent half of that at AA and finished it off in AAA. I wouldn’t expect Allen to go deep into this game, but I do expect close to a K per inning once those strikeout props are hung up by the books. The Marlins are much better against lefties than they are against righties, but that won’t drive me off Allen. The young lefty has had a double-digit strikeout per 9 inning rate consistently in the minor leagues. While a lot of things don’t translate well from the minors to the majors, one thing that tends to travel with a pitcher is his ability to strike hitters out. Although it tends to dip a bit at top level, the guys who can hover at or above a strikeout per inning tend to have the same double-digit K/9 rate you’ve seen from Allen.
Best MLB Hitter Prop Bet Today
Kyle Schwarber OVER 1.5 total bases
Kyle Schwarber has a great matchup on Sunday against José Ureña of the Colorado Rockies. Urena has been dreadful to start the season. In four starts, Ureña has only managed to make it through 14 innings of work. He’s allowed a 2.32 WHIP while giving up over a run per inning and allowing a HR every two innings of work. Philadelphia is a hitter-friendly ballpark too. Maybe not as hitter-friendly as Coors Field, but still one of the better ones in baseball. Schwarber has absolutely lit up right-handed pitching in his career. Over the last three seasons, he owns a 140 wRC+ score against righties with a .37 wOBA and a massive .318 ISO score.
The .318 ISO is way above average, even for your typical power hitters in their preferred batting splits. I wouldn’t be shocked to see Schwarber go yard today, and apparently the books wouldn’t be either. Of the few books with early home run lines listed, Schwarber is a measly +225 or +240 to hit one. Ureña has only made it through five innings in one of his starts all year, so I doubt Schwarber gets more than maybe two cracks at the struggling righty. Schwarber has 17 hits on the season, and nine of those 17 are doubles or home runs. That means if he connects for a hit in this game, there’s over a 50% chance that hit will result in two total bases or more to cash this bet. With Ureña struggling, and this being Schwarber’s favorite split, I like our chance of cashing this one.
