MLB Best Bets Today September 11

Key Highlights:

• Tigers vs. Yankees Predictions
• Angels vs. Mariners Pick

Twelve teams are off today, which means that we have nine MLB games on Thursday. It will be getaway day action in Baltimore, Chicago, and Toronto, while the other six games will go up against Thursday Night Football between the Commanders and Packers and also the start of Week 3 college football with NC State vs. Wake Forest. I’ve linked those previews courtesy of Zach Cohen on the NFL and yours truly on CFB, so you can check those out after reading through my MLB musings if you wish.

Six games doesn’t give us a whole lot to pick from, especially with the heavily-favored Padres against the Rockies representing one of the matchups. But, there’s always something and the goal is to find a something that wins.

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. Check out our new MLB tools powered by Ballpark Pal: Strikeout Projections, Park Factors, and YRFI Report.

Here are the MLB best bets today for September 11:

Tigers vs. Yankees Predictions (-150, 8.5)

7:05 p.m. ET

The series finale in the Bronx between the Tigers and Yankees will have a lot of interested parties. The Yankees, who are not a fundamentally sound baseball team at all, have been beaten 11-1 and 12-2 in the first two games of this series. Cam Schlittler is coming off of the worst start of his MLB career against the Blue Jays. Aaron Boone’s incessant whining and bitching at the umpires seems even more incessant of late. Things don’t seem to be going all that well.

And yet, the Yankees are just three games back of the Blue Jays in the AL East and still hold the top Wild Card spot. And based on the odds, they have a good chance to salvage the series finale.

My focus, though, is on the total in this game. Schlittler might overcompensate a bit after his first truly terrible start as a Major Leaguer. He needed 66 pitches to get just five outs against the Blue Jays, who scored four runs on five hits off of him. The Tigers don’t have the same contact skills as the Blue Jays, but they are a top-10 offense in wOBA over the last 30 days.

Nothing looked wrong under the hood for Schlittler with his velo or spin rates. In fact, his velo was up from previous outings. Maybe he was just a little too amped. Nevertheless, young pitchers don’t always bounce back well from those types of outings. That being said, the Tigers don’t hit extreme velo well, sitting 19th in wOBA, 16th in SLG, and 20th in BA against fastballs 97+ mph.

Even if we don’t get too much help from the Tigers offense, I think we will from the Yankees offense. Tyler Holton gets the start. In 7.1 innings as an opener, he’s allowed five runs on seven hits, including three homers. Surprisingly, AJ Hinch used Holton last night to face Amed Rosario, Trent Grisham, and Aaron Judge. Judge hit into an inning-ending double play after Rosario singled, but I was a bit surprised that Hinch would give the top of the order a look at Holton knowing he was opening tonight.

By the way, Judge’s double play was the hardest-hit ball of the night at 112.6 mph with a .630 xBA, so the Tigers got a bit fortunate. After Holton, Sawyer Gipson-Long will come in. He’s allowed 19 runs on 27 hits in 29 innings of work. He’s allowed a 40.9% Hard Hit% and a 12.5% Barrel% in 88 batted ball events. The Mets just touched him up for six runs in his last appearance and he’s allowed at least three runs in four of his seven appearances.

I don’t want to call this a punt from the Tigers, but it very well could become one. Detroit is a half-game ahead of Toronto for the No. 1 seed and the all-important bye in the AL playoffs, but they’re up 9.5 games in the division. They’ll arrive late in Miami tonight and have Tarik Skubal on the bump tomorrow. I could see Gipson-Long wearing a tough outing so as not to waste any arms. I very rarely take the -1.5 on a home team since they’re likely to only bat eight times, but I’ll take the shot here. Holton/Gipson-Long is a lot better than facing Casey Mize or Jack Flaherty.

Lots of stuff in this game, so we’ll see if it works out the way I hope.

Pick: Yankees Run Line -1.5 (+137); Over 8.5 (-105); 1st 5 Over 4.5 (-120)

Angels vs. Mariners Prediction (-158, 8)

9:40 p.m. ET

The Mariners won in walk-off fashion over the Cardinals last night and now face a division foe, as the Angels are in town. It was a late night, but a good one for Seattle. The Angels landed at SeaTac just after 8:30, while the Mariners were still playing their extended game against the Cardinals. So, I think there could be a mild hangover effect tonight for the M’s.

But more than that, I think it’s worth taking a look at fading Bryce Miller. In four starts since coming back from injury, Miller has a 5.06 ERA with a 6.94 FIP in 21.1 innings of work. He’s given up 12 runs on 17 hits, including seven homers, with a 14/6 K/BB ratio. He’s allowed a 54.4% Hard Hit% and a 13.2% Barrel%.

What concerns me the most is that Miller is going very fastball-heavy right now. He threw 45.8% fastballs against Cleveland two starts ago and 53.3% fastballs against the Braves last time out. Opposing batters own a .570 SLG against his four-seamer this season, up from .348 last season. His Whiff% is down on the pitcher and his velo is down a bit as well. He just hasn’t had his usual command while battling through injury.

By no means are the Angels a good offensive ballclub, but they are fourth in Barrel% over the last 30 days at 10.4% and they are second overall for the season at 10.7%. While their Hard Hit% has dropped recently, they’ve still been able to Barrel some mistakes and Miller has been making those.

Jose Soriano got thrashed last time out, but he’s been a much better road pitcher than home hurler this season, posting a 5.90 ERA at home and a 2.47 ERA on the road. While Anaheim does have the marine layer to kill fly balls, it rains very little, so the sun-baked infield is not great at times for an extreme ground ball pitcher. Soriano has only allowed four homers in 87.1 innings of work on the road.

And that brings me to Seattle’s offense. Over the last two weeks against righties, they are 10th in wOBA at .329, but a 9.7% BB% and a .446 SLG are the big reasons why. They only have a .249 BABIP as an offense. They’ve hit 16 homers and 11 doubles, but only have 38 singles in that span. They hit a lot of fly balls. Soriano has a 66.1% GB%. I don’t love this matchup for the Seattle offense.

At +120, I think the Angels 1st 5 moneyline is a worthwhile endeavor. I’m not sure I want to mess with the full game since the Angels have a bullpen ERA near 5.00 over the last 30 days, though it is worth noting that the Mariners bullpen has been worked a ton. All the primary guys pitched Monday and Tuesday and six relievers pitched yesterday. Nevertheless, I’ll stick with the 1st 5, but watch Seattle’s bullpen usage closely.

Pick: Angels 1st 5 (+1240)