The ALDS resumes Monday after fireworks in both NLDS games last night.
The pregame narrative: A play on Cleveland Guardians starter Matthew Boyd is my top prop pick of the day. I also have recommendations on Kansas City Royals teammates Salvador Perez and Boby Witt Jr.
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Best bet: Boyd over 4.5 Ks (-152)
Boyd should not be expected to work deep based on his regular season workload and how starting pitchers are handled in the postseason.
Cleveland pulled No. 1 starter Tanner Bibee with two outs and a man on in the fifth inning of Game 1, up 5-0. There’s no reason to expect the club will deploy its bullpen any differently today.
The Guardians bullpen had an MLB-best 2.57 ERA and 3.30 FIP in the regular season, ranking third in K%.
That said, this is a play on Boyd’s strikeout line, not his outs prop, and he can pile up punchouts in short outings. He’s been doing it all year.
Boyd made eight starts this season and hit the 90-pitch mark twice. He failed to go five innings in each of his last three outings but struck out five-plus batters in all of them.
The Detroit Tigers are a juicy matchup for any starting pitcher, let alone one with a 27.7% K rate who held opponents to a .212 batting average.
Detroit had the seventh-highest K rate versus lefties this season and was third in all situations in the second half. The swing-and-miss issues have continued in the playoffs, too:
G1 vs. Astros: 10 Ks
G2 vs. Astros: 13 Ks
G1 vs. Guardians: 13 Ks
The Tigers have struck out in 31.9% of their postseason plate appearances.
Key stat: Boyd was 6-2 versus this line during the regular season.
Quick picks
Perez over 0.5 RBI (+145): Kansas City’s all-star catcher has hit cleanup in all four Royals postseason games, which is where he was primarily slotted during the regular season.
In a key run-producing spot, Perez delivered 100-plus RBI for the second time in his career.
He has yet to drive in a run in the playoffs but has a hit in three straight games and was strong versus left-handers this season.
Perez hit .297 and slugged .510 versus southpaws, producing an OPS nearly 100 points greater than his mark against righties.
The veteran has also enjoyed success against the lefty the New York Yankees are deploying tonight, Carlos Rodon.
In 27 career plate appearances against Rodon, Perez is hitting .462/.481/.846 with three home runs.
Witt over 0.5 runs (+100): Witt is coming off an 0-for-5 game and is sitting on a .214 on-base percentage across his three postseason games.
But he’s only struck out twice and reached base in 22 of 24 September games.
Witt is too good of a hitter (MLB-best .332 average, fourth in OPS) to hold down for an entire series and Rodon is much tougher against left-handed hitters.
Righties posted an OPS 130-plus points better against the southpaw and he surrendered 28 of his 31 homers to RHBs.
Witt is a good bet to get on base and put himself in a position to score.
He scored the third most runs (125) in the regular season and also has the pop (career-high 32 bombs) to cash this on his own.
Picks made at 11:59 a.m. ET on 10/07/2024.
Chris joined NorthStar Gaming from Covers.com where he was a publishing editor and wrote betting content. Before that, he was the sports editor at VICE Canada, worked for theScore and covered the Blue Jays for MLB.com. In addition to filling out the lineup card each day for the editorial team, Chris writes frequently himself, primarily on the NBA and MLB.