MLB Best Bets Today April 19:
We’ll see if Mother Nature cooperates today and we get all 30 teams on the field. Yesterday was a wild weather day, as the Nationals and Rockies got snowed out and we had a million runs and multi-run homers in Chicago on a warm day with a very helpful breeze. Today’s forecast is tamed down for sure, but there are still some weather conditions to keep in mind.
Otherwise, it’s business as usual as we keep running through the rotations and get additional data points on all of these pitchers to see if we can make some determinations that will help now and in the future.
This article will run Monday-Saturday and I’ll write up a standalone preview for Sunday Night Baseball on Sundays. This year, we’ll also have MLB best bets from Greg Peterson posted with overnight lines.
My tracking sheet is here. For transparency sake, I also have tracking for my three MLB seasons at VSiN (2024, 2023, 2022). This year, I intend to work in more props, derivatives, and maybe even some parlay bets to have a more diversified MLB portfolio and attack some different markets. What worked for me in the past has not worked as well the last two years, so I’m looking to make some changes and that includes my bet distribution by type and market.
Odds are from DraftKings Sportsbook because they are widely available to readers and because of some of our betting tools. I highly, highly, highly encourage you to shop around for the best lines. Sometimes they will be at DK. Oftentimes, they will not. Do what you can to shop around and get as much bang for your buck as possible.
Feel free to use my opinions and thoughts, as well as our suite of MLB Betting Tools, including the DraftKings and Circa Betting Splits, Steve Makinen’s Daily Ratings, Greg Peterson’s Daily Lines, the 1st 5 Innings Analyzer, and Umpire Stats.
Here are the MLB best bets today for April 19:
Los Angeles Dodgers at Texas Rangers (-115, 8)
4:05 p.m. ET
The Dodgers and Rangers continue their interleague set in the Lone Star State with today’s matchup between Roki Sasaki and Nathan Eovaldi. Both pitchers are prospective regression candidates and we’ve seen the market come in against Sasaki and the Dodgers, at least from a full-game moneyline standpoint. I get it, as Sasaki has a 3.29 ERA with a 4.91 xERA and a 5.08 FIP over his 13.2 innings of work.
Well, a lot of that has to do with his obscene walk rate, but he has improved that. Sasaki has walked 13 and struck out 12 over his four starts, but he’s had two walks in each of his last two starts after walking nine in 4.2 innings to begin the season. Today, he draws a Texas lineup that has the lowest BB% in the league at 5.8%. Sasaki has allowed a little more hard contact with his efforts to be in the zone more, but it hasn’t really hurt him to this point.
I actually think that Eovaldi is the bigger concern in this start. He has a 2.55 ERA with a 4.36 xERA and a 2.87 FIP in his 24.2 innings of work. Unlike Sasaki, Eovaldi has been extremely stingy with the walks. He has a 24/2 K/BB ratio in his four starts. But, let’s dig deeper into the numbers. Eovaldi has a .222 BABIP against despite a lot of pulled and hard-hit contact. Now, he has kept the ball on the ground very effectively with a 52.4% GB%, but that’s all the more reason why I think his BABIP against and some of his other numbers should be higher.
According to Statcast data, Eovaldi has a xBA against of .276 and a xSLG against of .444. His .235 wOBA comes with a .338 xwOBA. He has allowed a 46.2% Hard Hit% with a 56.9% Pull%. A bad start is coming, as negative regression will catch up with him. It can be a dangerous game looking at single-start run metrics, but he’s had a SIERA over 4 in each of his last two starts and SIERA can be a good predictive stat.
Texas has a good bullpen by the numbers this season, but I’d still trust the Dodgers bullpen more. I was torn between the 1st 5 and the full game here, as the crux of my position is to fade Eovaldi, but I am not ignorant to the fact that Sasaki has some concerning signs as well. As a result, I’ll roll with the full game since it gives the better team more chances to be the better team.
Pick: Dodgers -105
San Diego Padres (-112, 7.5) at Houston Astros
7:10 p.m. ET
The Padres and Astros also continue their interleague series in the Lone Star State today with a really intriguing pitching matchup of Michael King vs. Hayden Wesneski. King is coming off of a complete game shutout of the Rockies. But, it is Wesneski who I have my eye on here in this start.
I correctly assumed that Wesneski would be a guy that the Astros could work with and turn into a real pitching weapon. So far this season, the former Cub has a 4.00 ERA with a 4.98 FIP in his 18 innings of work. He’s allowed five home runs on the season and eight runs on 10 hits in total. But, he has a 21/3 K/BB ratio, as the Astros coaching staff has unlocked some serious swing and miss potential…or have they?
Wesneski has faced the Giants, Mariners, and Angels in his three starts. In terms of swinging strike rate, those teams rank 6th, 2nd, and 9th so far this season. The Mariners have the lowest Z-Contact% in the league, so they swing and miss a ton and miss a lot of strikes. The Giants have the seventh-lowest. The Angels have the second-lowest O-Contact% on pitches outside the zone.
In this start, he draws a Padres team that has the third-lowest SwStr% in the league, trailing only Toronto and Arizona. San Diego hitters will chase, but they have the sixth-highest O-Contact% and lead the league by a comfortable margin in Z-Contact%. In all, they have the fifth-best CSW%, which is called and swinging strike percentage. The Mariners are 20th, the Angels are 24th, and the Giants are 26th.
When Wesneski has allowed contact, it hasn’t gone terribly well, as he’s given up a 44.2% Hard Hit% and an 11.6% Barrel%.
King has been terrific this season, ranking in the 79th percentile in xERA and 81st percentile in xBA. He’s also in the 82nd percentile in Whiff% and has done a pretty good job of mitigating hard aerial contact. He only has a 16-point difference between his .257 wOBA and .273 xwOBA. Wesneski, meanwhile, has a 40-point gap between his .267 wOBA and .307 xwOBA. I think we’ll see that play out as his K% regresses facing teams that make better contact…like the Padres.
Picks: Padres 1st 5 (-120); Hayden Wesneski (HOU) Under 4.5 Strikeouts (+115)
Athletics at Milwaukee Brewers (-125, 8.5)
7:10 p.m. ET
The theme of today’s picks is regression and Chad Patrick certainly personifies that. The Brewers right-hander was thrust into a tough situation due to injuries and he’s been terrific, allowing just one run on 10 hits in 14.1 innings of work as a starter. But, I’m not buying it at all. Patrick has a 100% LOB%, as the only run he’s given up came on a solo homer. He is running a .243 BABIP against and has eight walks against 12 strikeouts in his three starts.
He’s allowed a 39.5% Hard Hit% and only a couple of Barrels, so he’s done pretty well from a contact quality standpoint, but he only has a 7.8% SwStr% and has definitely run on the right side of the luck metrics that are out there. He has minimal margin for error with a 90.5% Z-Contact% and I can’t really see him continuing to carry a 25% infield fly ball rate.
The Athletics have been a top-10 offense to this point, as they rank seventh in wOBA. The park-adjusted stats like wRC+ probably haven’t really caught up to playing in Sacramento, but they’re making a ton of contact and rank above the league average in Hard Hit%. They’re also fifth in HR/FB%.
After a really strong debut against the Mariners, Luis Severino has had two bad starts against the Padres and Cubs and a good start against his former employer, the Mets. Severino has had single-digit SwStr% in each of his last three starts and he’s not getting a whole lot of chases. Not surprisingly, he owns a 47.3% Hard Hit%. He’s limited Barrels to help his cause, but still comes in with a 4.01 ERA and a 4.77 FIP.
With Severino pretty hittable and the strikeout not as big of a factor for the Brewers as usual, I think this is a game that has some runs early on.
Pick: Athletics/Brewers 1st 5 Over 4.5 (-120)
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