According to reports, MLB is going to start taking the baseball doctoring issue seriously. According to the article, they may roll out new checking protocol as early as next week. I’ll believe it when I see it.
It does make me wonder, when I’ve seen a few of the ‘elite’ pitchers having bad outings over the last few days, if some of the pitchers are trying ‘wit-out’ to try and get a feel for it before enforcement happens. Does this mean an imminent drop in strikeouts? We will see.
On to the K-Props…
Nationals @ Rays, 7:10 pm ET
The Rays’ Tyler Glasnow has hit double digit strikeouts in 3 of his last 5 outings and 6 out of his last 10. Unfortunately for us, none of those starts have been against the Washington Baseball Team. Lucky for us, those setting the line have given us a generous 7.5K over/under line to play with. I’ll take the over and -125 from DraftKings.
Yankees @ Twins, 8:10 pm ET
It’s been a pretty safe bet this year to bet the over on almost every pitcher facing the Yankees. Michael Pineda, pitching for the Twins tonight, looks like no exception. Pineda always has a chip on his shoulder when facing his old team, so even though 5.5 seems a touch high I’m going to roll with it. On FanDuel they are offering +114 for over 5.5 and I’ll put a little something there.
Indians @ Cardinals, 8:15 pm ET
It’s a Shane Bieber night in St. Louis as he takes the bump for the Indians. Interestingly, while he started the season with a crazy K/inning ratio, it’s dropped over the last few starts with the one exception being against the k-happy Tigers. With the line set at 8.5 I’m going to take the under and -135 from the folks at Wind Creek.
Come back again — same bat-channel — Batman out!