MLB Best Bets Today October 8:
The National League takes center stage today with Phillies/Mets in the early evening and Dodgers/Padres as the late game. All four series are tied at 1-1 as we begin the venue changes. Citi Field will host its first playoff game today, as the Mets have played all five away from home to this point. The Padres are back at Petco Park after sweeping the Braves there in the Wild Card Round.
As I talked about in the blurb I sent for today’s newsletter, The VSiN Daily, the playoffs are conducive to live betting with the pitching changes, pinch hitters, and the flow of the game much more evident and predictable than the regular season. Managers are more willing to give guys a chance in the regular season. Not here. You deploy your best matchups when you can. So, to me, that creates some live betting opportunity.
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Here are the MLB best bets today for October 8:
Philadelphia Phillies (-115, 7) at New York Mets
5:08 p.m. ET (FS1)
Aaron Nola and Sean Manaea are listed as today’s starting pitchers, as Nola takes the mound for the first time since September 29. Manaea got a start in the Wild Card Round against Milwaukee and allowed a couple of runs over five innings with four strikeouts against zero walks. Manaea was a savior for the Mets this season, who had to navigate some choppy pitching waters due to injury, mainly Kodai Senga, and ineffectiveness.
Manaea posted a 3.47 ERA with a 3.83 FIP in 181.2 innings, as the Mets got very lucky that he and Luis Severino were able to contribute to the degree that they did after some injury-plagued seasons over the course of their careers. Manaea’s ERA by half was nearly identical, but he was better in the second half than the first half. He held opponents to a .185 BA and a .262 wOBA over 85.1 innings in the second half. He did give up 12 long balls and gave one up in his Game 2 start against the Brewers, so that would be the thing to watch for here.
The wind will be blowing out a little bit to RF and first-pitch temps will be in the 70s, so it will be a decent day for hitters. Ten of the 21 homers that Manaea gave up had runners on base. That’s what he’ll need to avoid here. You can live with solo homers, even in the playoff run environment. It’s the multi-run homers that are killers.
If you remember, I mentioned how the Phillies were a .500 team in the second half. A lot of it had to do with their offensive performance against righties. Well, they had a .351 wOBA and a 125 wRC+ against lefties. Those two numbers both ranked second behind the Diamondbacks, who were the league’s best offense for like four months.
Nola finished with a 3.57 ERA and a 3.94 FIP, but the long ball was an issue for him, too. He allowed 30 gopher balls in 199.1 innings, but was able to offset it with a 197/50 K/BB ratio. Nola did fall short of 200 strikeouts for the first time in a full season since 2017. His contact management numbers were pretty similar to what he has typically posted.
Unlike Manaea, Nola was not better in the second half. He allowed a .292/.341/.484 slash with a .354 wOBA in his 79.2 innings of work. Those numbers were substantially higher than the .215/.262/.377 with a .278 wOBA that he had in the first half. He actually posted a 4.91 ERA over his final 33 innings of the regular season.
And now he’s on a pretty extended layoff to pitch a playoff road game. Nola allowed 13 homers with men on base and actually allowed a .460 SLG with men on compared to a .400 SLG with the bases empty. The Mets have done a really good job of avoiding strikeouts late in the year as they’ve made their playoff push.
I think this total is low. We’ve seen both bullpens struggle already and there is a lot of familiarity between these hitters and those arms. Both offenses should match up well enough against the starters.
Pick: Phillies/Mets Over 7 (-112)
Los Angeles Dodgers at San Diego Padres (-162, 8)
9:08 p.m. ET (FS1)
The Padres are a huge favorite against the Dodgers in this one. Michael King, coming off of a 12-strikeout gem against the Braves last week, is the listed hurler for the host team, while Walker Buehler is set to go for the Dodgers. This was the problem coming into the series for the Dodgers and neither Yoshinobu Yamamoto nor Jack Flaherty has pitched well.
LA has gotten 8.1 innings out of their starters with nine runs allowed and only three strikeouts. It is the playoffs, so expect the unexpected, but it’s hard to see that run of bad performances ending with Buehler. He had a 5.38 ERA with a 4.68 xERA and a 5.54 FIP in his 75.1 innings of work during the regular season and posted a 4.44 ERA over 26.1 innings in September with a .265/.336/.451 slash against. Now, he’s been awesome in 15 career playoff starts with a 2.94 ERA and a 3.16 FIP, but obviously he was in a much better situation in previous years.
This is just such a striking number because you don’t see the Dodgers a dog of this magnitude. I think the other thing we need to keep in mind here is that Dave Roberts is hoping to push Buehler through the order one time. Unfortunately, he allowed a .336/.403/.570 slash and a .416 wOBA the first time through in his 29 innings across 144 batters faced.
King had a 2.95 ERA with a 3.33 FIP in the regular season and that awesome start against the Braves. You don’t typically find mismatches this large in the MLB playoffs and so that’s why the line is where it is.
I don’t have a play here. The Padres are deservingly big favorites and the bullpen should have a lead to protect. I’m sure there will be a lot of player prop activity on San Diego. Maybe this game just plays out to expectations. If that’s the case, I don’t see a ton of line equity in it.
