MLB Best Bets Today May 2

All 30 MLB teams will attempt to take the field on Friday, but games in Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and Atlanta look to be very threatened by the possibility of rain. It’s May. That will happen. What’s more interesting to me is that we only have one interleague series this weekend, much like we only had one interleague series during the week.

I guess the other interesting thing is that underdogs crushed it yesterday, which really hadn’t been the case recently. Also, seven road teams won, bringing the road winning percentage over 40% for the first time in a long time. There is some negative regression on tap for home teams moving forward I think, so we’ll see if the visitors have more success now that everybody is fully in rhythm with the season.

This article will run Monday-Saturday and I’ll write up a standalone preview for Sunday Night Baseball on Sundays. This year, we’ll also have MLB best bets from Greg Peterson posted with overnight lines.

My tracking sheet is here. For transparency sake, I also have tracking for my three MLB seasons at VSiN (2024, 2023, 2022).

Odds are from DraftKings Sportsbook because they are widely available to readers and because of some of our betting tools. I highly, highly, highly encourage you to shop around for the best lines. Sometimes they will be at DK. Oftentimes, they will not. Do what you can to shop around and get as much bang for your buck as possible.

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.

Here are the MLB best bets today for May 2:

Cleveland Guardians at Toronto Blue Jays (-155, 8.5)

7:07 p.m. ET

Logan Allen and Chris Bassitt square off here in the series lid-lifter north of the border. This is going to be a one-sided handicap for me and I am looking at the Blue Jays lineup against Allen.

Allen has three good starts and two bad ones to his name, as he was pummeled last time out by the Red Sox to the tune of seven runs on nine hits in just 4.1 innings. His other bad outing was his first of the season against the Padres, where he walked five in 5.1 innings and was very fortunate to only allow four runs with 12 of the 24 batters he faced reaching base.

By current wOBA against LHP, Allen’s opponents – Padres, White Sox, Orioles, Pirates, Red Sox – rank 13th, 28th, 30th, 22nd, and 8th. The Blue Jays rank 5th at .338. So this is, theoretically, the worst matchup that Allen has had thus far. And the two above average offenses against him have 11 runs on 16 hits with eight walks and just three strikeouts in 9.2 innings of work.

In my mind, this is a really brutal matchup for Allen, who has run five starts this season with a SwStr% of just 5.9%. Ironically, his highest SwStr% came last time out against Boston. The Blue Jays are one of the league’s best at making contact and avoiding strikeouts, so Allen better hope all the batted balls get hit right at people. I’ll take my chances that they don’t.

This is also a game where Stephen Vogt may have to let Allen absorb a bit of a beating. The bullpen has been used extensively of late again, as Cleveland had won three straight low-scoring games. Kolby Allard pitched a high-leverage 10th inning yesterday for the win. If Allen is getting torched, Vince Velasquez is the next option, so the full-game TOR Team Total and even run lines and whatnot could come into play.

Ultimately, though, this is my favorite bet of the bunch.

Pick: Blue Jays 1st 5 Team Total Over 2.5 (+105)

Minnesota Twins at Boston Red Sox (-110, 9)

7:10 p.m. ET

The Twins and Red Sox battle it out on Friday night at Fenway Park. Boston has to be happy to be back at home after Rogers Centre turned into a house of horrors over the last two days. Of course, Minnesota has to be feeling the same way after blowing out the Guardians in Game 1 of a four-game set before losing three straight.

Anyway, the teams are in Beantown and there are a few reasons why I expect Boston to bounce back. First and foremost, the Twins just aren’t very good and they’ve been putrid on the road so far. While Joe Ryan is off to a spectacular start with a 3.18 ERA, 3.43 xERA, and a 3.47 FIP, I don’t love this matchup for him.

He’s a guy that has had a home run problem throughout his career as a fly ball pitcher who throws a ton of strikes. It will be a balmy evening in Boston with a nice breeze blowing out. That should help Boston hitters more than Minnesota hitters, since Brayan Bello is traditionally more of a ground ball guy. Ryan’s primary pitch is his fastball, which he throws nearly 60% of the time. His top two secondaries are a slider (21%) and a splitter (15%).

By Pitch Type Value on Statcast, the Red Sox are 12th in fastball batting value, third in slider batting value, and lead the league by a wide margin on splitters. In fact, only eight teams have a positive run value against splitters and Boston’s 6.0 mark is more than double the next closest team.

Bello is still working his way into the season, as he has a 3.27 ERA but a 7.37 xERA and a 6.33 FIP in two starts. The Twins don’t draw a lot of walks and like to put balls in play, so I don’t think Bello’s early K/BB struggles are all that relevant here. Bello has only allowed a 36.4% Hard Hit% in his two outings and has a 53.1% GB%.

Minnesota’s bullpen had a hefty workload yesterday in a game that was delayed by rain twice. The Red Sox got length from Tanner Houck before Justin Slaten had an eighth-inning blow-up yesterday. He’s about the only arm unavailable. I think they right the ship tonight.

Pick: Red Sox -110

Chicago Cubs (-120, 9) at Milwaukee Brewers

8:10 p.m. ET

NL Central rivals come together as the Cubs and Brewers battle for the first time this season. The two teams that were expected to jockey for position for first place as the season goes along will play 13 games in total and every one of them will be important.

Ben Brown and Quinn Priester are the listed starters for today and I’m expecting runs in this one. Brown has gotten a bit unlucky this season with a 6.04 ERA, but a 4.85 xERA and a 4.17 FIP in his six starts. He’s allowed an 11.1% BB% and just gave up six runs on nine hits to the Phillies. He’s had some issues working deeper into games, which always concerns me because you end up getting the lesser relievers in those middle innings.

He has also allowed a 44.9% Hard Hit% this season, so the high BABIP and the difficulty with stranding runners has a lot to do with the contact quality that he has allowed. The Brewers still have a lot of solid offensive pieces. Milwaukee’s 103 wRC+ is slightly above average and ranks 15th in MLB. They have a K% under 20% against righties and a BB% north of 10%, so a guy like Brown may not find as many swings and misses, but could absolutely allow some free passes.

The Cubs have been one of the top offenses all season long and Priester is a pitch-to-contact guy with very little attributes that stand out. He’s got a 20% Chase Rate and just an 8.6% SwStr% over his four starts. Priester has a 3.79 ERA, but a 4.57 xERA and a 4.27 FIP, so there are negative regression signs in the profile. He has a .343 wOBA with a .346 xwOBA, so I don’t see much sustainability to his 77.7% LOB%. The high GB% at 57.6% is definitely doing a lot of heavy lifting with the low K% and a 14.1% BB%.

We should see a lot of traffic in the early innings of this game. And we could see some traffic late as well. The Cubs are 23rd in reliever ERA and the Brewers are 27th in that department. Both bullpens have high walk rates and below average strikeout rates, so the chance for baserunners is pretty high in the later innings as well.

It is something of a lofty total at 9, but getting it at plus money looks good to me.

Pick: Cubs/Brewers Over 9 (+102)