Happy Friday, fellow sports bettors! Thursday was kind of rough for us on the MLB side of things. We went 1-2 to run our record to 87-87 on the young season. Our player props parlay cashed, but the other two straight bets went down in flames.
It's been an up-and-down season so far, and this week has been especially frustrating. We swept the board with a 3-0 mark on Tuesday, but Wednesday and Thursday were awful days. Our goal is to finish off May strong to get back on the right side of the ledger.
We're a couple of games under .500 this week, so let's cash these two strikeout props parlays to get back near even. Best of luck, my friends!
LAA at CLE- 7:10 PM EDT and COL at NYM - 8:40 EDT
Ortiz struggled against this Angels squad back in early April, but he's looked like a much different pitcher since then. I'm expecting him to get some sweet revenge against the Halos tonight at home. The 26-year-old has a K-rate that ranks in the 70th percentile, mainly because his fastball often touches 97 mph.
The Angels have been one of the lowest contact rate teams in all of baseball this season. No other team strikes out more than this LAA squad, so Ortiz should be able to rack up at least 5 Ks. Five LAA hitters fan at least 24% of the time, and Logan O'Hoppe, Zach Neto, and Jorge Soler all have K-rates of 29% or higher.
Peterson is more of a ground ball guy, but there's no reason he can't carve up this pitiful Rockies lineup. We've made a small fortune fading Colorado this season, and there's no reason to stop now. The Rox have the 2nd-highest strikeout rate in MLB against lefties, and six of their hitters fan at least 23% of the time.
STL at TEX- 8:05 PM EDT and PIT at SD - 9:40 EDT
Liberatore makes me nervous at times, but I think he'll handle this Texas lineup quite well on the road. The crafty lefty's K-rate isn't all that great (46th percentile), but his chase rate has been off the charts this season (92nd percentile). I'm expecting Liberatore to get lots of swings and misses with both his slider and his cutter tonight in Arlington.
The Rangers' offense has been missing in action all season long, and I don't see that turning around against Liberatore's nasty off-speed stuff. Texas has the 3rd-highest K-rate in baseball against southpaws, so look for Liberatore to get us to 4 Ks pretty early in this one.
Pivetta is a guy that I've enjoyed betting on for more than two years now. The 32-year-old righty gets plenty of extension, so his 94-mph fastball looks more like 97 or 98 to most hitters. He also gets a fantastic matchup tonight at home against the lowly Pirates.
Pittsburgh doesn't fan as often against righties as they do lefties, but I still think Pivetta can handle them quite easily. The P'Rats have the 10th-highest K-rate over the last two weeks. Let's close out the Friday card with a late-night Over on Pivetta.