MLB Best Bets Today April 23:
We’ve got a handful of getaway day games to go with a good set of night games on Wednesday April 23, as the fourth week of the MLB season gets completed. We started back on March 27 and there have definitely been a few surprises to this point. Most notably, road teams have won at a much lower pace than usual, something I wrote about yesterday. Road teams went 5-10 last night and are 5-18 over the last two nights, so it isn’t really getting any better. The Rays lost 5-1 in just their fourth road game of the season and they’re now 0-4 on the road.
As usual, I’ll ignore the early starts in the interest of lead time and focus on the later games.
Top MLB Resources:
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). This year, I intend to work in more props, derivatives, and maybe even some parlay bets to have a more diversified MLB portfolio and attack some different markets. What worked for me in the past has not worked as well the last two years, so I’m looking to make some changes and that includes my bet distribution by type and market.
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 April 23:
Baltimore Orioles (-142, 9.5) at Washington Nationals
6:45 p.m. ET
The Beltway Series continues with the Orioles and Nationals, as Tomoyuki Sugano makes his fifth career MLB start and Trevor Williams makes his 166th. This is going to be a pretty straightforward handicap from me, as there are several negative regression signs in the profile for Sugano and some reasons to be hopeful about Williams.
Through four starts, Sugano only has a 7.8% SwStr% with just eight strikeouts in 21 innings out of 87 batters faced. He’s allowed four homers and eight runs on 22 hits. Sugano has a 3.43 ERA, but a 6.42 xERA, 5.60 FIP, and 4.98 xFIP to start his MLB career. His 89.3% LOB% is definitely something ripe for regression and his 41.1% Hard Hit% and 12.3% Barrel% suggest that continuing to carry a .261 BABIP against may be difficult.
Thus far, Sugano has allowed a .272 BA, but his xBA based on batted ball data is .319 and he has a xSLG of .568. He ranks in the bottom 5% in xBA, bottom 10% in xERA, bottom 6% in Whiff%, and bottom 1% in K%. He’s also in the 19th percentile in Barrel%, so he has a .342 wOBA against with a .398 xwOBA against.
Williams was in the midst of an outstanding 2024 season when injury cut it short. He made a huge pitch usage change to throw fewer fastballs and more sliders and it paid immediate dividends. Williams had a 2.03 ERA with a 3.17 xERA and a 2.79 FIP over 13 starts and 66.2 innings before suffering a near-season-ending malady. He made two September starts and allowed one run on six hits with 12 strikeouts in 10 innings to go into the offseason with a few positive vibes.
This season, Williams has a 5.95 ERA, but a 3.62 xERA, 4.30 FIP, and a 4.08 xFIP. He’s allowed three homers in 19.2 innings, which is all he allowed over 66.2 innings last season. His low LOB% of 68.3% should positively regress. Even as a low K% guy through a good chunk of his career, he’s still posted a 73.3% LOB% lifetime. His Hard Hit% is trending well and his Barrel% is near his career averages, so I’m not too worried about the homers he’s allowed just yet.
Williams has had putrid fastball command thus far, but I think we see heightened sweeper and changeup usage moving forward to counteract that. As it is, he’s already throwing fewer fastballs. Maybe he’ll mix in a few more sinkers moving forward. But, he has a .369 wOBA with a .311 xwOBA, so basically the opposite of Sugano.
The Baltimore bullpen hasn’t been as good as I expected, but their 4.55 ERA with a 3.73 FIP suggests better fortunes are on the way. They’ve allowed a league-high .343 BABIP against, so as that normalizes, the bullpen will achieve better numbers.
Meanwhile, the Nationals bullpen has a 7.09 ERA with a 5.00 FIP, so there are some signs of improvement, but not really that much. I’d like to shy away from their bullpen here. Unfortunately, that means trading 25 cents from +120 for the full game to -105 for the 1st 5. Nationals -0.5 on the run line for the 1st 5 is +130. I don’t mind that either, but I’ll take the push protection just in case, especially since the crux of my argument is Williams > Sugano.
Pick: Nationals 1st 5 (-105)
Chicago White Sox at Minnesota Twins (-270, 8.5)
7:40 p.m. ET
The White Sox and Twins meet again in a battle of AL Central rivals. It has not been a good start to the season for either team, but one ballclub definitely has a lot more upside and it is the one that is the heavy favorite in this spot.
My focus in this handicap is on Twins starter David Festa. The 25-year-old right-hander has really good stuff, but the financially-strapped Twins have been playing some service time games with him and Zebby Matthews. There is no reason for Festa and Matthews to not be fixtures in this rotation at this point and it seems like they’ve gotten there with Festa, who is making his third straight start.
Twice in those starts, Festa has had some difficulties in the fifth. In his start against the Tigers, it wasn’t his fault, as he allowed a leadoff single, got two outs, gave up another single that became a debacle with a Matt Wallner error that scored a run and got another guy to third.
In his second start against the Mets, he gave up two singles, got a strikeout, and then hit Francisco Lindor with a pitch, so he left with the bases loaded. Festa has allowed eight hits thus far and seven of them have been singles. He has 10 strikeouts against two walks. At some point, the Twins have to trust him to push through the fifth and I think that time could be tonight against the hapless White Sox.
I got absolutely screwed out of Kris Bubic’s win for the Royals last night, as he threw seven shutout innings and closer Carlos Estevez got two outs in the ninth before walking the bases loaded and allowing a three-run double. But, I’ll give it another shot here with Festa.
What’s interesting is that Over 15.5 Outs Recorded is +150 and To Record A Win is +160. He’d have to go at least five innings for the win and the Twins draw Bryse Wilson, who has already given up four home runs and 16 hits in 12 innings. Jhoan Duran had a long appearance yesterday, but everybody else is good to go, even if he isn’t. Given that I can get 15 outs from Festa and still have a good crack at him getting a win, I’ll go that route, especially with how averse Rocco Baldelli is to letting starters work deep.
I do think because he’s been close so far, but hasn’t gotten a win yet this season and was only the winning pitcher twice in 13 starts last season, Baldelli has a little more patience here to let him battle through five innings. He only went over 15 outs once last season in 13 starts, so exactly 15 outs feels too scary to play both or try the Outs prop.
Pick: David Festa (MIN) To Record A Win “Yes” (+160)
Toronto Blue Jays at Houston Astros (-110, 8.5)
7:40 p.m. ET
Daikin Park is the site of Blue Jays vs. Astros, as we get a matchup between Bowden Francis and Ryan Gusto. The Astros offense is starting to wake up a little bit. They are 14th in wOBA over the last 14 days at .319 and have a 112 wRC+ in that span, which ranks 11th. Conversely, the Blue Jays offense has gone in the tank, posting an 82 wRC+ that ranks 26th with a .277 wOBA that is also 26th over the last 14 days.
Toronto has dropped four in a row and only scored eight runs in the process. They’ve scored just 14 runs over their last six ames and now draw a really promising prospect in Gusto, who has a 73.9% F-Strike%, 14.3% SwStr%, and four pitches that grade above average by Stuff+. In fact, his 107 Stuff+ is tied for 57th out of 262 pitchers that have thrown at least 10 innings this season.
This will be Gusto’s third start. He’s allowed five runs on 13 hits with eight strikeouts, but he did face the Padres last time out, who were very aggressive. The Blue Jays will be, too, so hopefully he can make some adjustments to that. He did induce a high Chase Rate and had a double-digit SwStr% against the Padres, which is not an easy feat given their low K% and swing-and-miss rate.
Francis has allowed a .308 wOBA, but Statcast data has him down for a .400 xwOBA. His xwOBACON is .482, which puts him in the bottom 6% of the league. That stat is for Expected Weighted On-Base Average On Contact. Gusto at least can induce some chases. Francis has a xERA of 6.52, which ranks in the bottom 10% of the league.
The Astros have actually been swinging it way better against right-handed pitchers of late. They rank 10th in wOBA at .333 and eighth in wRC+ at 122 over the last 14 days with their right-handed hitters against right-handed pitchers. That’s important because Francis has been hit hard by lefties to start the year and has done well against righties, but the Astros offense is coming around. They also have the most PA in that split with 285. By the way, the Blue Jays only have a .289 wOBA with a 90 wRC+ in that split.
So, I like Gusto more against the Blue Jays than I like Francis against the Astros. The Astros pen is in fine shape and they’re playing a bit better right now than the Blue Jays are.
Pick: Astros -110
Pittsburgh Pirates at Los Angeles Angels (-135, 9)
9:38 p.m. ET
Former Angel Andrew Heaney leads the Pirates into Game 2 of this interleague series against the Angels. The Pirates got the road trip off to a good start with a 9-3 win over the Angels last night and they’ll look to keep it rolling into tonight’s tilt with a matchup against Jack Kochanowicz.
Heaney has been very good to start the season, as he’s allowed just six runs on 17 hits with a 22/6 K/BB ratio. He struck out 10 Yankees in his start against them on April 6, so we’ve seen some pretty impressive upside from him to this point. The left-hander runs into an Angels crew that ranks 24th in wOBA against LHP and 22nd in wRC+ so far this season. The Angels also have just a 3.8% BB% against a 26.3% K% in that split.
Obviously the Pirates offense isn’t very good, but they should have the chance to put a lot of balls in play against Kochanowicz, who has only struck out 10 of 89 batters faced. He’s allowed 15 runs on 23 hits as a pitch-to-contact sinkerballer. He has a 6.20 ERA with a 4.94 xERA and a 5.78 FIP, so there is some room for improvement, namely due to his 63% LOB%, but it usually takes more than his current strikeout rate to strand runners effectively.
The Pirates are also 28-for-32 in stealing bases against right-handed pitchers, so I think they’ll be aggressive on the basepaths, looking to generate some run-scoring opportunities or stay out of double plays. Also, for as unimpressive as the numbers are for the Pirates, they are ninth in Hard Hit% and 13th in Barrel%, so there are some underlying signs of improvement on the horizon.
All things considered, the Pirates have had some solid relief work, as they rank seventh in RP ERA and 13th in RP FIP. The Angels are 26th in FIP and 28th in ERA in those two areas. So, I’ll take a shot on the Pirates with a better starter, better bullpen, and maybe the better offense, at least of late.
Pick: Pirates +114
