Live With Lindy MLB Picks & Research Recap (7/25)
This Live With Lindy MLB picks recap comes from a marathon Saturday research show that Eric Lindquist opened with a confession: July has been a grind, down nearly nine units on home runs alone, buried under some of the worst bad beats of the season. Instead of chasing his way out, he did the opposite. He spent this Saturday research show attacking the board through pitching, stolen bases, and the odds screen, hunting small, repeatable edges rather than hero swings. That is the thread that runs through every play below: with the bats cold, Lindy is not betting the likeliest outcome, he is buying the lowest-hold, most mispriced number he can find. Value is price versus true probability, and closing-line value, not any single result, is his north star.
One vocabulary note before the plays, because it changes how you tail this. A lean is a game he likes but did not bet. An official play is one he actually fired. We do not promote a lean to a bet that never got made.
Jackson Merrill — one of the featured players on today's slate.
In Summary
- The Favorite Bet Of The Day: Jake McCarthy (COL) to hit a home run, a big plus-money longshot leading off against a lefty he crushes, confirmed once the Rockies lineup dropped mid-show.
- The Stolen-Base Attack: Jackson Merrill (SD) and Jake Cronenworth (SD) to swipe a bag in Miami, because Joe Mack sat and the Marlins' backup catcher cannot control the running game behind Eury Pérez.
- Pitching First: Casey Mize (DET) Over 16.5 pitching outs already cashed, plus a Washington Nationals first-five run line built on Mitch Bratt owning the worst raw stuff on the slate.
- Low-Hold Strikeout Overs: Hunter Greene (CIN) over 6.5 punchouts and a laddered Sean Burke (CWS) over, both bought into thin markets for the closing-line value.
Watch The Video
Lindy built this entire card live with the OddsShopper odds screen open, upgrading prices as the board moved and reacting to lineups in real time. Watch it in his own words: Watch on YouTube.
Why Low Hold Is The Whole Game
Lindy spent a real chunk of this show on the lesson underneath every pick: when the results go against you, the only thing that keeps you alive is paying less to be wrong. The lower the hold on a market, the less often you have to win to profit, so he shops every number across books and de-vigs it down to a fair price before he ever compares it to what a book is offering.
The cleanest example was his fade of the Toronto bats. He looked at the marquee Dylan Cease strikeout market sitting at a punishing 7% hold, walked away from it, and bought the identical opinion — Cease carving up a Blue Jays lineup that has been downright helpless against right-handed pitching for two months — as a Blue Jays first-five under 3.5 runs at a shade better than the standard -110 juice. Same read, fewer fees. That is the move I keep coming back to across this card: he is not trying to be right more often, he is trying to be charged less for the same opinion. Over a long enough season, that fee difference is the whole edge.
The Stolen-Base Attack In Miami
The cleanest example of finding a market the books guard loosely came in the Padres–Marlins game. Miami's Eury Pérez (MIA) is one of the easiest arms in baseball to run on, with a deeply negative net-base advantage and 15 steals allowed against just three caught, and he is normally bailed out by elite defender Joe Mack (MIA) behind the plate. Mack was out of the lineup. That leaves backup Liam Hicks (MIA), who is merely fine, throwing out runners at a 16% clip. That single lineup change is the bet.
So Lindy fired Jackson Merrill (SD) to steal a base at a plus-money number, plus a small Jake Cronenworth (SD) stolen-base ticket at a much longer plus-money price, since Cronenworth hits behind Fernando Tatis Jr. (SD) and often gets a lead with Tatis already occupying a base ahead of him. He passed on Tatis's own steal number, calling it too efficient to touch. The tell that this was real information: Merrill's price moved as the show ran and other bettors read the same lineup card.
Pitching First: Mize Cashes, Washington In The First Five
With the hitting weather soft across most of the slate, Lindy led with arms. Casey Mize (DET) Over 16.5 pitching outs was his first cash of the morning in the Royals–Tigers game, a bet built on Mize surviving a 20-pitch first and then getting efficient against a soft lineup.
His favorite side play was a Washington Nationals first-five run line in the Diamondbacks–Nationals matchup. The logic is pure pitcher isolation: Foster Griffin (WSH) grades out with the highest first-five win probability on the entire slate, while Arizona's Mitch Bratt (ARI) owns, in Lindy's words, the single worst raw stuff of any starter on the board. Bratt has been dominant in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League but abhorrent in his short big-league sample, and against a Washington lineup that mashes left-handed pitching, laying a half-run in the first five is the spot. He flagged the risk honestly, but had the edge well inside where the price should be.
On the strikeout side he stayed with low-hold overs. Hunter Greene (CIN) over 6.5 punchouts against St. Louis in the Reds–Cardinals game leaned on the best swing-and-miss profile of the day. And Sean Burke (CWS) — a 26% strikeout arm limiting walks against Houston in the Astros–White Sox matchup — got the laddered treatment across his 5.5 and 6.5 numbers, staked heaviest on the lower line where the closing-line value was already rolling his way.
The Plus-Money Home Runs: A Worked Example
Here is the value lesson in one bet. Lindy's favorite play of the day was Jake McCarthy (COL) to go deep, a big plus-money longshot in the Rockies–Brewers game. On the surface it is a lottery ticket. Under the hood it is the math: McCarthy is the rare left-handed hitter who owns same-handed pitching — a 154 wRC+ against left-handers — and he draws exactly that, a lefty starter, with McCarthy confirmed leading off once the Rockies card dropped mid-stream. Lindy's projection had him far more likely to homer than the fat price implied. That gap, not the odds, is the reason to bet it. Is McCarthy likely to hit a home run? No, he has 10 all year. Is it positive expected value? Clearly yes, and that is the only question that matters.
He paired it with Brooks Lee (MIN) to go deep at another plus-money number in the Athletics–Twins game. The angle is lineup mechanics again: with the A's likely running a bullpen game, the switch-hitting Lee is priced as an eighth-place hitter but has real upside to bat first or second and see right-handed arms all day. He is positive EV at the current number precisely because the market has him slotted lower than he is likely to hit.
Featured Fired Plays (7/25)
| Play | Market | The read |
|---|---|---|
| Jake McCarthy (COL) | To Hit A Home Run | Leadoff, 154 wRC+ vs LHP, plus-money misprice |
| Brooks Lee (MIN) | To Hit A Home Run | Priced as an 8-hole bat, likely to hit higher in a bullpen game |
| Jackson Merrill (SD) | To Steal A Base | Joe Mack out; Pérez easy to run on |
| Jake Cronenworth (SD) | To Steal A Base | Bats behind Tatis, plus-money longshot |
| Casey Mize (DET) | Over 16.5 Pitching Outs | Cashed; efficient after a heavy first |
| Washington Nationals | First-Five Run Line | Griffin's edge vs Bratt's bottom-tier stuff |
| Blue Jays (TOR) | First-Five Under 3.5 Runs | Cease's whiffs vs a lineup helpless vs RHP; low-hold buy |
| Hunter Greene (CIN) | Over 6.5 Strikeouts | Best whiff profile on the slate vs STL |
| Sean Burke (CWS) | Over 5.5 Strikeouts (Laddered) | 26% K rate vs Houston, CLV rolling in |
The row that matters most is the Merrill steal, because it is built on a lineup card the market moved on fast — but not before Lindy got down. The moment Joe Mack sat, an ordinary catcher's caught-stealing rate became the whole edge, exactly the kind of information that evaporates the second everyone else reads the same card.
What The OddsShopper +EV Screen Flagged
Lindy's read on cold bats was not just a feeling. The same de-vigged odds screen he was working on stream surfaced its best value on the "under" side of the hit and total-base props, where the fair price sits well below the best takeable number. Callback to that Toronto fade: Bo Bichette (TOR) landing on this board with a double-digit edge is the exact market echo of a lineup that cannot hit right-handed pitching right now.
| Player | Market | Fair | Best takeable | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brandon Nimmo (NYM) | Under 0.5 Hits | +172 | +202 (Bet365) | +11.0% |
| Tyler Stephenson (CIN) | Under 0.5 Hits | +159 | +185 (Bet365) | +10.0% |
| Bo Bichette (TOR) | Under 0.5 Hits | +159 | +185 (Bet365) | +10.0% |
| Cole Young (SEA) | Under 0.5 Hits | +164 | +180 (Bet365) | +6.1% |
| Shohei Ohtani (LAD) | Under 0.5 Hits | +174 | +190 (Bet365) | +5.8% |
| Angel Martinez (CLE) | Under 0.5 Hits | +151 | +165 (Bet365) | +5.6% |
| Josh Bell | Under 1.5 Total Bases | -152 | -134 (DraftKings) | +5.3% |
| Jonathan Aranda (TB) | Under 0.5 Hits | +178 | +190 (BetMGM) | +4.3% |
| Brandon Nimmo (NYM) | Under 1.5 Total Bases | -148 | -135 (Bet365) | +3.9% |
| Jose Ramirez (CLE) | Under 0.5 Hits | +180 | +190 (Bet365) | +3.6% |
The line that jumps out is Brandon Nimmo Under 0.5 hits: a fair price of +172 available at +202 on Bet365 is an 11% edge, and it is the single reason the screen exists — the longest number is not the value, the best number relative to fair is. If you are shopping a book like BetMGM for one of these prices and do not have an account yet, check BetMGM's current sign-up offer and how to claim it before you leave a bonus on the table, and run any bonus bet through the free bet converter so you do not waste it on a chalk favorite.
FAQ
What is Live With Lindy? It is Eric Lindquist's live MLB show on the OddsShopper YouTube channel. This edition was the Saturday MLB Research + Data Deep Dive, where he works the whole board game by game, separating bets he fired from games he only likes.
Why is the Merrill stolen base the sharpest play? Because it is a lineup edge, not a talent call. Miami's Eury Pérez is one of the easiest pitchers in baseball to run on, and with elite defender Joe Mack out of the lineup, an average backup catcher becomes a green light for San Diego's runners.
Why take Jake McCarthy's longshot home run? Because value is price versus true probability, not the likeliest outcome. Lindy's projection had the plus-money number underpriced given McCarthy's platoon edge and confirmed leadoff spot, which makes the longshot the positive-EV side even though a home run is unlikely on any single night.
The Bottom Line
Saturday was another July grind, and Lindy played it the honest way: no chasing, just the mispriced and the low-hold. The reads that stick are the ones a projection sheet alone could not have handed you — Merrill and Cronenworth turning a benched catcher into a stolen-base edge, and Jake McCarthy's plus-money homer being the sharper buy than any shorter, safer-feeling number. Every one of them comes back to the same test the odds screen is built to run: is the number you are getting better than the true odds? Price your own card on the OddsShopper MLB odds screen and cross-check the hits props board before you fire a single ticket.
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