MLB Best Bets Today June 12

Eight games are on the MLB card for Thursday June 12. There are day games, as is always the case when you get these Thursday slates. I’ll still be looking at the late games, as is also always the case so that there is some lead time for readers. That narrows today’s available games down to pretty much five.

For your daily weather update, it doesn’t look bad at all for today’s games, so we should be looking at our third straight day of smooth sailing. One last note, I’ve got some time away from the computer coming, so Jonathan Von Tobel will be covering the MLB article for me for a couple of weeks, starting tomorrow. Thanks to JVT for sliding that into his busy schedule and catch him on Money Moves from Noon to 2 p.m. ET.

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 June 12:

Pittsburgh Pirates at Chicago Cubs (-206, 7.5)

8:05 p.m. ET

The Pirates and Cubs battle it out in an NL Central matchup at Wrigley Field to fire up a four-game weekend set. This is the only night game of the series and the cooler temps are definitely accounted for with this total of 7.5. It will be southpaw Andrew Heaney for the Buccos and former Pirate Jameson Taillon for the Cubbies.

My handicap here is on Heaney, whose last eight starts have been pretty uninspiring. He has a 4.39 ERA with a 5.38 FIP and a 5.14 xFIP over those 41 innings of work. Heaney only has 21 strikeouts against 18 walks in that span, but he’s got an 82% LOB% and a .252 BABIP doing some very heavy lifting to keep his ERA below 5.00. In that span, Heaney has allowed a 46.8% Hard Hit% and a 10.1% Barrel%.

Those are not numbers that should lead to a .252 BABIP. He’s given up eight homers in those eight starts out of the 41 hits allowed. His 7.1% SwStr% is another concern that I have. Also, in his last two starts, he’s only had a Chase% of 14.8% and 14.3%, so he’s not really generating a lot of Whiffs or weak contact that way.

The Cubs are a league-average offense over the last two weeks, so they’ve been struggling a tad. They are still seventh in wOBA against LHP, though, and with all of the negative regression signs for Heaney, I think they’ll be able to capitalize.

Pick: Cubs 1st 5 Team Total Over 2.5 (+114)

Chicago White Sox at Houston Astros (-250, 7.5)

8:10 p.m. ET

The White Sox and Astros come together for some Thursday Night Baseball, as Davis Martin and the Pale Hose are heavy underdogs to Framber Valdez and the ‘Stros. I’m looking at a player prop here in this one and it is with Martin, who has been a pitch-to-contact guy this season to say the least.

Martin will not have to contend with left-handed hitter Yordan Alvarez, whose hand fracture still isn’t healed yet. The only lefties he is likely to see in tonight’s lineup are Vic Caratini and Jacob Melton. Caratini has been a poor hitter this season with a 7.4% BB% against RHP and Melton is a rookie with 12 strikeouts against just two walks thus far.

Martin has only walked 4% of the righties that he has faced this season. After posting a 7.8% BB% in March/April, he cut it down to 4.2% in May and did not walk anybody in his first June start. The Astros are going to throw seven or maybe eight right-handed bats at him here, so this should bode well for his control stats. Martin’s 8.8% SwStr% is the 14th-lowest among 79 qualified starting pitchers, so guys put a lot of balls in play against him and the Astros are 24th in BB% overall and 23rd in BB% against RHP.

Pick: Davis Martin Under 1.5 Walks Allowed (-105)