Eric Lindquist walked into Thursday's show off a month where home runs carried the whole card, and the first thing he did was refuse to treat a hot streak as a reason to bet more. Lindy's MLB picks for Thursday come off a five-game card plus one NFL game, and it's the kind of day that rewards price over form: there is exactly one home run he wants, one total he's willing to pay extra juice to buy down, and one NFL prop he likes far more than the spread it replaces. Everything else on the board, including a Rangers-Mariners game with two big strikeout arms, he's happy to leave alone. The one game he wouldn't touch at all, and the number he came closest to laying before the travel scared him off, are both below.
Zack Wheeler — one of the featured players on today's slate.
The Quick Answer
Lindy's Thursday, September 10 card is three official plays: Jeremy Peña (HOU) to hit a home run against Zack Wheeler (PHI) at Citizens Bank Park, the Colorado Rockies (COL) at New York Yankees (NYY) over bought down from 9 to 8.5, and a Blake Corum (LAR) rushing ladder at 43, 50, and 60 yards for the San Francisco 49ers (SF) vs. Los Angeles Rams (LAR) game in Australia. The leans he didn't fire are the Tampa Bay Rays (TB) moneyline in Atlanta and a Jared Jones (PIT) number that is a few cents from making the card. The full case for Peña against a pitcher who has shut righties down all year, plus the strikeout game he passed on entirely, is below.
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The Card At A Glance
| The Play | The market | The read |
|---|---|---|
| Jeremy Peña (HOU) | To hit a home run vs. PHI | A long price on a righty-on-righty power bat in the best hitting conditions of the day; the show's own number is well inside the market's |
| Rockies At Yankees | Over 8.5, bought down from 9 | Half a run is worth the extra juice when one Colorado run tips the whole game script |
| Blake Corum (LAR) | Rushing ladder: 43+, 50+, 60+ yards | Garbage-time carries in a game the Rams are built to put away, sized lighter at the top rung |
Jeremy Peña Against Zack Wheeler Is The Bomb Of The Day
The home run play is the one that sounds wrong until you look at the splits. Zack Wheeler (PHI) has shut right-handed hitters down all season, a 32% strikeout rate against them, and the Philadelphia Phillies (PHI) sit as a solid favorite because of him: OddsShopper's board had the best takeable Philadelphia moneyline at -170 at Bet365 early Thursday, almost exactly the de-vigged fair number, so there's no edge on the side itself. None of that is the case for Peña. The case is everything around Wheeler.
Jeremy Peña (HOU) has 15 home runs against right-handed pitching this year with a strikeout rate against righties around 22%, a combination that reads as a genuine righty-on-righty power outlier, and the show has been riding him since his MVP-race stretch, before an injury knocked him out of that conversation. Then there's the park. Citizens Bank Park is the best left-handed hitting environment in baseball and it isn't bad for righties either, and Thursday's forecast was hot and humid with the wind blowing slightly out to right at the time of the show. The other side of the matchup helps too: Cristian Javier (HOU) might not be long for this game if the Houston Astros (HOU) go to a bullpen-heavy plan, and a bullpen day usually means a longer, higher-scoring game, which is how Peña gets a fourth or fifth trip to the plate.
"It's one of those square peg, square hole things where the only thing that doesn't match up is how good Zack Wheeler is." Lindy, on why the price is long in the first place.
That's the whole bet in one sentence. Wheeler is great, and that's why the market posts a long number on a bat like this. The home run is priced meaningfully shorter here than the board has it, and at the market's price it's a play, with a note that after Sunday's Brayan Rocchio (CLE) bomb, nothing short of a price north of 15-to-1 is going to compare, and there's no forcing that. Kyle Schwarber (PHI) and Bryce Harper (PHI) got a look on the Philadelphia side against Javier and stayed off the card, which is the point of the show: the obvious bats in the obvious spot aren't the play, the mispriced one is. Jeremy Peña (HOU) to hit a home run against Zack Wheeler, at a long price he makes materially shorter.
The Rockies-Yankees Over Is Worth The Half Run
The half run between 8.5 and 9 is a huge gap in baseball, worth 15 to 20 cents of price depending on the game environment, the starters, and the bullpens by Lindy's own math, and this is the game where paying for it makes sense. Colorado Rockies (COL) at New York Yankees (NYY) is a good ballpark and a good game environment, with Ryan Feltner (COL), a 5.91 ERA and a strikeout rate under 17% on the season, on one side and Max Fried (NYY), a 2.73 ERA, on the other, and neither team's situation is one to fall in love with on its own. Fried is the reason the left-handed Colorado bats like Jake McCarthy (COL) and Mickey Moniak (COL) are a problem, and the read is that Moniak probably sits against him. The Colorado bullpen is one of the worst in baseball, and the Yankees' pen, thoroughbreds and all, only gets deployed in the game scripts that call for it. Up five or up six, the leverage arms never enter; it takes a tie game to force them out.
The read is a game-script one. One Colorado run against Fried probably tips the over into favorite territory on its own, and the Yankees bat in a ballpark where a ninth-inning pump is always live. By the show's read the total belongs higher than 9 in this environment, which makes the extra juice to get down to 8.5 cheap, so the play is to pay it rather than take the flatter price at 9 and give the half run back. The show usually leans the aggressive way on totals; this is the rare spot where the safer number wins. Whichever version you take, the price difference between the two is exactly the kind of thing worth checking at every book before you click. Colorado Rockies at New York Yankees over 8.5, bought down from 9.
Blake Corum's Rushing Ladder Beats Laying The Rams' Spread
The NFL game is the one spot on the card where the play he made is a replacement for the play he almost made. The San Francisco 49ers (SF) at Los Angeles Rams (LAR) game is being played in Australia on a schedule built for a Thursday night window at home, and the spread was close to a lay: 3.5 with a Rams team framed, by the show's read of the PFF grades, as the top-ranked unit in almost every category against the 24th-graded 49ers defense. Nick Bosa (SF) and Fred Warner (SF) are both coming off injuries. In a perfect world both play every snap; the expectation is a snap count on Bosa and some limitation on Warner after he missed last season, and that's what pushed the spread toward a lay in the first place.
Two things stopped it: the travel, with the Rams only taking off for Australia the day of the show, and a playing surface that couldn't be researched to satisfaction. So instead of the spread, the play is the bet that pays if the same game script plays out: Blake Corum (LAR) getting the garbage-time carries in a game the Rams put away. Kyren Williams (LAR) is the passing-down back and the one Los Angeles wants healthy for January, and Corum was the more efficient runner between the two down the stretch last season while pushing 35-40% of the snaps in the playoffs. Corum's receiving-yards prop sits at half a yard, which tells you which half of the backfield he is.
The ladder is 43+ rushing yards as the base rung, 50+ at plus-money, and 60+ as the long rung, with the base rung posted at Bet365 at the time of the show and the top rung sized lighter. If Matthew Stafford, Davante Adams, and Puka Nacua get theirs and Los Angeles is up two scores in the fourth quarter, Corum is the sneaky beneficiary, and this is the kind of prop you bet before you see it, because the market adjusts once it does. Blake Corum (LAR) rushing ladder, 43+, 50+, and 60+ yards, lighter at the top.
What Lindy Is Watching, Not Yet Plays
| The Lean | Where it stands |
|---|---|
| Tampa Bay Rays (TB) Moneyline At ATL | Stated lean on a winning road team; not fired |
| Jared Jones (PIT) Number Vs. CWS | A few cents from the card; needs the price to come down |
| Logan Gilbert (SEA) Under 6.5 Strikeouts | Pick'em-only idea, not a standalone bet |
| Los Angeles Rams (LAR) -3.5 Vs. SF | Close to a lay; the Australia travel kept it off the card |
The Tampa Bay Rays (TB) moneyline in Atlanta is the lean stated plainly on the show and still not fired. Nick Martinez (TB) is 14-4 with a strikeout rate under 15%, and the surprising part is how well a soft-tosser like that has limited power outside of one four-homer game against the White Sox. Martín Pérez (ATL) is effective on the other side too, with the occasional random strikeout spike. The original idea was attacking Pérez with Tampa Bay's right-handed bats, abandoned because the Rays' strikeout rates are so low that there's almost no variance to exploit, so it lands as a road-team lean on a winning club that gets it done without much power beyond Junior Caminero (TB). No play.
Jared Jones (PIT) is the one that came closest to the card. Lindy's own break-even on the Jones number sits right around where the market is, technically positive expected value by his count but not by enough, and his words were that the price would have to come down "a little bit" before it makes the card. The other side of that game is a White Sox bullpen day: Hagen Smith (CWS), a lefty with no starts this season, is the listed probable, with a lefty-heavy pen behind him, and the day sets up for bulk innings from Luis Castillo (CWS), who has been torched in four straight outings, allowing at least three earned runs in each and eight hits in three of them. Colson Montgomery (CWS) and the left-handed bats stacked at the top of the Chicago order are the wrinkle in the matchup.
"You never walk away from the table when you're on a heater." Lindy, on Corey Seager, in the one game he still wouldn't touch.
Then there's the game he flatly declined. Texas Rangers (TEX) at Seattle Mariners (SEA) puts Jacob deGrom (TEX) against Logan Gilbert (SEA), two pitchers with massive strikeout props, and none of it is appealing. Corey Seager (TEX) is on a heater, and Gilbert is probably the toughest matchup Seager has seen in this series. Both teams very much want to win this one: by the standings the Rangers sit a game and a half out of the last AL wild card spot, while Seattle is five and a half back, with Gilbert, in Lindy's words, kind of playing for next year. Logan Gilbert under 6.5 strikeouts stays a pick'em-only idea, something he'd add to an entry if it shows up there, not a bet he'd fire on its own. The 49ers-Rams spread, as covered above, stays on the shelf for the same reason as the Australia trip itself.
Also Grinding The Board: Thursday's +EV Edges
The show passed on Rangers-Mariners, and that's the game where OddsShopper's own board is separately finding the biggest edges on the slate. Every number below is live off the board, de-vigged to a fair price, as of early Thursday morning.
| Market | Best price | Fair (de-vigged) | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jacob deGrom (TEX): Under 6.5 Total Strikeouts | +110 (Bet365) | -108 fair | 9.0% |
| Julio Rodríguez (SEA): Under 0.5 Total Hits | +160 (Bet365) | +142 fair | 7.4% |
| Brock Rodden (SEA): Over 0.5 Total Hits | +120 (Bet365) | +106 fair | 6.8% |
The deGrom under is the row worth sitting with. The whole reason the show passed on this game was two big strikeout props, and the board says the market is paying plus-money on deGrom falling short of seven strikeouts when the fair price is a small favorite, the largest edge anywhere on Thursday's MLB slate. It's the same shape as the Gilbert-under idea he filed under pick'em-only, just on the other starter and at a price the board likes. Julio Rodríguez (SEA) and Brock Rodden (SEA) round out the same game with hits-prop edges that only exist because the books haven't caught up to the fair number yet, which is why the prices are worth grabbing early if you grab them at all.
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- MLB Picks Hub: Today's Live Boards and Series
- MLB Home Run Picks Today: The Full Board
- Lindy's Long Balls: September 8
- Lindy's MLB Picks: Friday, September 4 Leans, Likes & Locks
This recap covers Eric Lindquist's official plays from the Thursday, September 10 "Lindy's Leans, Likes & Locks" show; follow his full card, including his daily home run column, on Tails. Bets are opinions, not guarantees. Please gamble responsibly, 21+.
