MLB Best Bets for Monday (9/20)

While everyone was distracted by Week 2 of the NFL, Boston and Baltimore helped us turn things around in our MLB  Best Bets Sunday by exploding for eight runs in the first five innings to cash our over. If you recall from Sunday’s writeup, I had put out there “I’m expecting runs to be scored in this one and I’m expecting them early,” and then boom, eight runs in the first three innings of the game. Additionally, I wrote “While I am expecting most of the offensive help to come from Boston in this one, I do think Baltimore can pitch in a run or two early to help us hit our over,” and guess what? Five runs from Boston to do most of the heavy lifting while Baltimore chipped in a few runs of their own. It feels good to be back in the win column and even better when you predict exactly how your win will happen. 

We have a shorter slate for Monday, but it’s a great opportunity to reinvest our winnings from yesterday and continue to grow our bank roll. The MLB Best Bets column is up just over 14 units for a sparkling 11.4% ROI on the year and we’re looking to increase both of those marks.

Toronto Blue Jays @ Tampa Bay Rays

Toronto -130, DraftKings Sportsbook; Tampa Bay +120, Caesars Sportsbook

Toronto and Tampa Bay will begin an extremely important series at Tropicana Field Monday, with Toronto holding a slim 1.5-game lead over the New York Yankees for the second AL Wild Card spot (with Boston leading Toronto by a game for the first slot). The new leader in the AL Cy Young race, Robbie Ray, will get the start for Toronto to square off against Tampa Bay rookie Shane Baz, making his first career start.

Thanks to Gerrit Cole’s most recent 5.2-inning, 7-ER blunder at home against Cleveland, Robbie Ray is the new frontrunner for the AL Cy Young Award, and I’m shocked it took this long for books to update their odds. While most pitchers have fallen off down the stretch a little, Ray has seemingly gotten better. He hasn’t allowed more than three earned runs in any of his last 10 starts and has allowed two or fewer earned runs in nine of those. Over that span, his ERA is sitting at a miniscule 1.80 to go along with a 2.14 FIP. He has been putting up fantastic numbers all year long, but even with elite marks across the board, his barrel rate (9.2%), hard hit rate (42.4%) and average exit velocity (90.2mph) all rank in the bottom-25% of major league pitching. Over this same recent 10-start stretch, however, he’s even been able to reel those marks back to above average, and it really seems like he’s firing on all cylinders at this point. Ray has made five starts against Tampa Bay this year, throwing 34 innings, and has averaged 15.3 K/9, 0.8 BB/9, 36.2% K% and 2.4% BB%. He’s held Tampa Bay hitters to just a .238 wOBA overall and has just a 2.81 FIP against them this year. Ray is in the midst of what could be the best 10-game stretch of his career, and I don’t see this lineup getting in his way Monday.

Toronto’s offense gets the luxury of being able to feast on a rookie making his first career big-league appearance. Not much needs to be said to describe how dominant Toronto’s lineup is, as they have the league’s highest .341 wOBA and the second-ranked 114 wRC+ overall. For relevant splits regarding this matchup, they’ve been performing at relatively equal levels with a .340 wOBA, again pacing the league, and 113 wRC+ vs RHP, which also ranks second. It would be perfectly normal to think that their offensive production might drop off a little on the road, but you know what they say about assuming right? Even on the road, Toronto has the second-best offense with a .335 wOBA and 112 wRC+, trailing only Houston. They’ve proven to be one of the hardest teams in the majors to strikeout, having the lowest K% (20%) facing righties and the second-lowest K% (20.6%) on the road, while also having top-10 marks in both BB/K and ISO. Since the All-Star break, they lead the league with a 42.7% hard-hit rate and a 90.7mph average exit velocity while owning the second-highest 9.8% barrel rate. This offense is really clicking heading into the home stretch and facing a rookie making his first career appearance is a great spot for them to feast.

Baz was drafted 12th overall in 2017 by the Pittsburgh Pirates and is currently Tampa Bay’s sixth-ranked prospect, No. 63 overall. Baz did have some impressive strikeout and walk numbers in the minors this year, putting up 12.52 K/9 with 2.15 BB/9 in AAA, but any projections I see on him don’t have such a positive outlook. Over the next three years, ZiPS doesn’t project him to have any lower than a 5.50 FIP while also expecting his strikeout and walk numbers to regress significantly. With a 36% K% in AAA, Baz relies heavily on himself to record outs via strikeouts and if that’s the case, then facing one of the hardest major league lineups to strikeout might make for a long day for him. We did see Tyler Gilbert throw a no hitter in his first career big-league start earlier this season, so success right out of the gate isn’t extremely rare, but facing a lineup as potent as Toronto’s gives me the impression that this could be closer to an implosion than a record-breaking start for Baz.

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If there is one hole in Tampa Bay’s offense, it’s that they are extremely susceptible to striking out and even more so facing left-handers at Tropicana. As I touched on when I went over Robbie Ray, Tampa Bay has an astronomical 36.2% K% against him this season without even being able to scratch out one walk per nine innings. They have the third-highest K% facing southpaws and the fourth-highest at home, while having mediocre at best BB/K marks. If you’re going to do damage against Ray, it’s going to be because you earned it and not because he gave up any free baserunners. Another narrative that works against Tampa Bay as they’ve only managed to hit .169 as a group against him this year with a .189 OBP and a .379 SLG. They’ve only managed to score seven runs off Ray in 34 innings total this year, and I fully expect him to be able to shut them down again in this one.

The pick

I’m venturing away from totals for this one and leaning heavily toward Toronto. I was slightly surprised to see them priced so low, especially facing a pitcher making his debut, but they are on the road so I suppose the -130 does make some sense. Ray is on a torrid stretch like no other while Tampa Bay’s offense has sunk to the depths of the league over the past week with just a .269 wOBA and 73 wRC+. Toronto’s lineup will be too much for Baz to overcome in this one, but since Tampa Bay holds the bullpen advantage, I’m shortening this to just the first five innings. Toronto F5 -130, FanDuel