MLB Best Bets Today July 2
Nine games are on the baseball betting board, but some of them are of the getaway day variety as it’s a Thursday and an exciting weekend of MLB action is on the horizon. Six of the games are late games, though, so we still have plenty of options and some really good series, including White Sox vs. Guardians and Padres vs. Dodgers to think about.
I’ll be posting my daily best bets Monday-Saturday with a Sunday Night Baseball preview on Sunday, as all the day games make it tough to get something out with lead time out here in Las Vegas. All lines are from DraftKings and are current at the time of publish. Please take the initiative to SHOP AROUND for the best odds. It matters. A lot.
One new offering this baseball season is our Opta AI Player Prop Projections. They are for VSiN Pro Subscribers only, so you can check out our current offers here. Zachary Cohen will be using those projections and his own handicapping to write up MLB player props.
Greg Peterson will have his best bets posted the night before and you can also check out his daily lines to see what looks to be off-market. Steve Makinen has also released his updated Bullpen Betting Systems and DraftKings Splits Systems, plus he’ll have a daily analytics report.
Feel free to use my opinions and thoughts, as well as our suite of MLB Betting Tools, including the DraftKings and Circa Betting Splits, Steve Makinen’s Daily Ratings, Greg Peterson’s Daily Lines, the 1st 5 Innings Analyzer, and Umpire Stats. Check out our MLB tools powered by Ballpark Pal: Strikeout Projections, Park Factors, and YRFI Report.
Here are the MLB best bets today for July 2:
Rays vs. Royals Prediction
Pick: Rays -126
It’s a sweltering day in Kansas City where Ian Seymour and Stephen Kolek are the listed starters. I really like Kolek in general as a pitcher, and his numbers were pretty good before he gave up nine runs in his last start against the Cardinals, but that is entirely possible with a guy like him, especially in these conditions.
Kolek has worked 52 innings for the Royals and only has 34 strikeouts. Even though he’s running a 46.1% GB%, his HR/FB% is up to 15.4% thanks to the three homers he allowed last time out. Even with a couple of Barrels last time out, he’s only allowed a 7.2% Barrel% and a 38.6% Hard Hit%, but he still has much thinner margins than a guy capable of racking up some punchies.
Seymour has been a nice find for the Rays and he just threw 6.2 no-hit innings against the Royals as the team took a combined no-hitter into the ninth inning. He’s struck out 52 over 50 innings of work and, while he has a 4.32 ERA, his 3.35 xERA is very nice. He is more of a fly ball guy, which is a concern in this start, but his 8.3% Barrel% shows his ability to pitch above and below the zone for hitters to square up a ball. He also has just a 35.6% Hard Hit%.
Over the last two weeks, the Rays are hitting again, posting a .379 wOBA with a 143 wRC+, both of which rank second. The Royals are 17th in wOBA at .311 with a 94 wRC+. Against lefties, specifically, the Rays are fifth in wOBA at .348 and the Royals are 12th at .327.
I’ll ride with the better offense and the better bullpen on a hot day in KC.
