Best Bets for Thursday MLB games!

Thursday sees a limited slate of games. We went 5-1 yesterday, and cashed a nice round-robin parlay. Hope keep that run going!

BEST BETS

San Diego Padres at Minnesota Twins (12:10 PM ET)

Yu Darvish and the Padres are slated to face Bailey Ober and the Twins in Minneapolis today, and in the first five innings at least, this is a pitchers duel. Bailey Ober has an impressive 0.98 ERA in 3 starts this season. He has a nasty slider that has, so far, limited hitters to a .125 batting average and 45.2% whiff rate, which goes far to explain why he’s surrendered only 14 hits surrendered in 18.1 innings. Today he faces a Padres lineup that is super suspect on the road, with a .213 batting average (3rd-worst) and .669 OPS (5th-worst). On the other side of the card, there’s Yu Darvish, the Padres’ ace is quietly putting together another solid season—a 3.19 ERA supported by a solid 83 WHIP+ and 3.14 xERA. Darvish has allowed 1 earned run (or less) in 4 of his 6 starts this season. Today he faces a Minnesota offense with a combined .189 average and .240 OBP over the last 14 days. The under is definitely the play here, although I gotta admit that I’m happy to take the 8.5 or 8 runs (instead of 7.5 runs) because I’m rather worried about the Twins’ pen in late innings.

Bet the game total UNDER 8 runs (-110).

 San Francisco Giants at Arizona Diamondbacks (8:40 PM ET)

The Giants go back on the road to wash away memories of a shellacking at the hands of Washington yesterday afternoon in SF. Their chances of setting things right are greatly improved by the fact that the D-Backs will send Tommy Henry to the mound. His 5.17 ERA is poor, and his 6.48 xFIP and 6.28 SIERA suggest that positive regression is not in the cards. Alex Cobb gives the Giants the distinct starting pitching advantage with a 2.01 ERA (2.97 xFIP and 3.07 SIERA). Their respective bullpens (3.98 and 3.97 SIERA) are statistically similar, so the pitching advantage goes to the Giants. I am a huge fan of the direction in which the Diamondbacks are heading, and I’ll be fading them less and less in the future. But tonight’s game is likely going to be an Alex Cobb show.

Bet the GIANTS to win money line -135.

Best of the Rest

• Bet the METS to win -1.5 run line (-130).

• Bet the WHITE SOX to win money line (-105)

• Bet the Yankees/Rays UNDER 8.5 runs (-115)