St. Louis are sending right-handed pitcher Sonny Gray to the mound as the team is in Miami to begin their series against the Marlins. With Miami striking out at a high rate against right-handed pitchers lately, we’ll look for Gray to rack up strikeouts in tonight’s matchup. Let’s get to our best MLB prop bet today!
Our MLB bet shopping pages integrate data from our industry-leading betting model to identify home run picks with positive expected value (+EV) each day. If you’re hungry for more than just the picks we post for free, sign up for OddsShopper Premium today.
Best MLB Prop Bet Today | Sonny Gray
In his first year with the Cardinals, Sonny Gray is having a career year. In 68.2 innings (12 starts), he has a low 3.12 xERA (career best and 79th percentile in the league), an even lower 2.58 xFIP (career best), very high 33% SO rate (11.93 per nine, career best, up from 24.3% last year and 95th percentile), impressive 31.5% CSW%, and 12.5% Swinging-Strike% (also career best).
Gray strikes out batters from both sides of the plate at a healthy clip (35.1% of righties and 30.5% of lefties) and is usually good for five to six innings, though he does need to be efficient given his modest pitch count (throws around 85-90 pitches. As for today’s strikeout prop (6.5), Gray went over it in six out of the last 10 starts, including in three of the last five.
Notably, Gray is projected for 24%-25% SO rate for the year by season-long projections, so he should see a dramatic decrease to his SO rate moving forward. With that being said, a matchup against the struggling, strikeout-happy Marlins is a great opportunity for Gray to continue his elite form for at least one more start.
Miami has the ninth highest collective strikeout rate against right-handed pitchers in the last month of baseball (24.2%, 592 plate appearances) and the fourth highest over the last two weeks (25.8%, 244 plate appearances). Today’s expected lineup includes six batters that strike out at or above the average rate against right-handed pitchers this year, above all Tim Anderson (R, 29.3%), Jake Burger (R, 27.6%), and Bryan De La Cruz (R, 26.3%).
Pinnacle has the over at -140, and given Gray’s rates, recent form, and the plethora of strikeout candidates up and down Miam’s expected lineup, getting -115 for him to record seven or more strikeouts in tonight’s matchup is quite appealing.
Best MLB Prop Bet Today: Sonny Gray Over 6.5 Strikeouts (-115 at BetRivers)
OddsShopper – Find the Best Bets and Odds for the NFL, NBA, MLB, and More
