Juan Soto handled business as expected with a first-inning home run followed by a great game overall. The problem came in the Christian Yelich vs Yordan Alvarez matchup, which I felt was the much more difficult one to predict. Alvarez had a good game, but Yelich looked unstoppable against the Cincinnati Reds. Overall, it was a loss, and we’re shifting out focus to a pitcher prop on PrizePicks tonight. Whenever you have the chance to back two elite arms in the MLB, it’s never truly a bad idea. Below, you’ll find my favorite bet involving Max Scherzer and Gerrit Cole.
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2/2 Power Play – Max Scherzer and Gerrit Cole
Max Scherzer o7.5 strikeouts
I’ll preface this by saying that there are weather concerns in both games, but I love these numbers if both games play. I’m also not here to predict weather nearly 12 hours in advance, so I’ll make the bet and get refunded my money if one of the two doesn’t play.
Scherzer’s looked good as a New York Met, and his strikeouts have come to him over his last two games. Over that span, he’s posted 19 strikeouts over 13 innings. Overall, his strikeout rate and all of his advanced metrics (swinging-strike rate, CSW%, etc) are similar to what they’ve been the last few years of his career. Ultimately, he enters this game with a 12.2 K/9.
Scherzer gets an interesting matchup against the Philadelphia Phillies. He’s faced off against them twice this season, somewhat “struggling” in both games. Overall, he’s given up 5 earned runs with 16 strikeouts over 11 innings.
The Phillies don’t strike out at an overly high rate against right-handed pitching this season. With that being said, they’re striking out at the fourth-highest rate in the MLB over the last two weeks. Scherzer also posted 9 strikeouts over 6 innings against them in their last game. Furthermore, he allowed 4 earned runs in that game, and I expect him to throw better tonight.
Gerrit Cole o7 strikeouts
It isn’t a secret that Cole isn’t quite the same pitcher without some advantages at his disposal. But is he truly that much worse? No. His advanced metrics look completely fine for an elite pitcher, although they aren’t quite as great as the last couple of years.
The bigger concern is his K/9 dropping from 12.1 last season to 10.1 this season. He’s posted more than 6 strikeouts in only 1 of his 5 games to start the season. With that being said, there isn’t truly much reason to panic at this point.
Cole’s velocity looks fine. The bigger concern is that he’s throwing his slider at a significantly lower percentage than last season. Nearly all of his numbers look completely fine, though. He’s getting slightly fewer called strikes, suggesting he isn’t locating his pitches as well as he’d like. His swinging-strike rate is completely fine, though. He’s also getting a normal number of swings on pitches outside of the zone.
Ultimately, people love trashing Cole for several reasons, and there is some truth to him not throwing as well without help. It’s completely overblown, though, and we can take advantage of a great number, even if this is a tough matchup.
Bet Max Scherzer over 7.5 strikeouts and Gerrit Cole over 7 strikeouts to win 3x
