MLB Best Bets Today July 25:
After we had a pretty full schedule on Monday, we get a lot of travel days on Thursday. We also get a lot of getaway day games, as four of the eight games are a.m. starts for us out here in Pacific Time. The pickings are pretty slim on today’s card, but we do have some interesting games, with just five days left until the MLB Trade Deadline. With 14 teams off and eight more done early in the day, perhaps we see the first dominoes fall.
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Article runs Monday-Saturday, odds current from DraftKings at time of publish, SHOP AROUND for the best prices. Tracking sheet is here.
Here are the MLB best bets today for July 25:
Tampa Bay Rays at Toronto Blue Jays (-115, 7.5)
3:07 p.m. ET
There aren’t a whole lot of options today, but this one looks like the best of the bunch because it features Taj Bradley. The Rays right-hander features a 0.92 ERA with a 2.61 FIP over his last eight starts covering 49 innings of work. He’s actually gotten through seven innings three times in that stretch and six innings twice more. He also came back from the Break and stayed on track with seven shutout, one-hit innings against the Yankees.
In that span, Bradley has only allowed a 6.1% Barrel% and a 33.9% Hard Hit%, so he’s done a better job of limiting hard contact as well. He has a 58/17 K/BB ratio and has only allowed three homers, as he’s done a much better job of leveraging his splitter as both a swing-and-miss pitch and a ground ball weapon. His GB% in that span is 48.2%. It is very hard to score runs off of guys with over a strikeout per inning and a high GB%.
Chris Bassitt goes for the Blue Jays and he’s hit the skids a little bit of late. He had a tremendous run from May 1 to the end of June, but he’s allowed 12 runs on 20 hits in three July starts. Maybe he needed a break, but he came back from the All-Star Break and allowed five runs on seven hits in 6.2 innings to the Tigers, as he struggled the second and third times through the order.
Bassitt had walked four in each of his two starts before the Break. He is over 35 and has been the subject of some trade rumors with a 3.71 ERA and a 3.85 FIP, so maybe the age and the rumor mill are having a bit of an impact. He has a 4.23 xERA and below average Chase% and Whiff% numbers, so I also think he’s a guy in line for some negative regression.
I’ll back the better starter in a toss-up spot, but avoid the inconsistent Rays pen.
Pick: Rays 1st 5 (-115)
