MLB Best Bets Today October 31

The MLB season began for the Dodgers on March 18. It could end tonight. The Blue Jays are 27 outs away from their first World Series title in over 30 years after taking two of the three games at Dodger Stadium.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto started that March 18 game in his native Japan, a game that the Dodgers won 4-1. He has the chance to push the Fall Classic to a winner-take-all Game 7 with a strong effort tonight. Kevin Gausman will attempt to prevent that, as he makes the biggest start of his career. All the drama begins at 8 p.m. ET.

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 October 31:

Dodgers (-144, 7.5) at Blue Jays

8 p.m. ET

This one feels like it could be an edge-of-your-seat pitcher’s duel, as Yamamoto has shined all season long. He had a 2.49 ERA with a 2.73 xERA and a 2.94 FIP over 173.2 innings of work. In the postseason, he’s had a 1.57 ERA with a 2.86 FIP over 28.2 innings of work. Between a 23.4% K% and a 55% GB%, he’s been really stingy, including one of the rarest outcomes of the present-day postseason, a complete game. Oh, and he has TWO of them.

He allowed one run on four hits with eight strikeouts in his start against the Blue Jays coming off of a week and a half worth of rest. He’s on a more normal turn in the rotation here, as the long layoff between sweeping the Brewers and the start of the World Series pushed the calendar down the line pretty far.

Gausman does have some strong negative regression signs in his postseason profile, as he has a 2.55 ERA, but a 4.88 FIP and a 4.96 xFIP. He has a 92% LOB% with a .156 BABIP against and he only has an 18/9 K/BB ratio. He gave up three runs on four hits in his start against Yamamoto in Game 2, including two homers.

Gausman gave up eight hard-hit balls on his four-seam fastball and threw 60% heaters. I would think that we see a big alteration in his pitch usage in this start. He only threw four sliders in that outing, all to right-handed batters. I think he’s going to have to mix his pitches more here. He’s really only a three-pitch guy with the fastball, splitter, and slider and had just 8.7% slider usage during the regular season, but the margin for error is so much thinner on fastballs.

Gausman got eight Whiffs on 13 swings with the splitter and just three Whiffs on 25 swings with the fastball. This is an “empty the tank” sort of start since he won’t be used tomorrow in any capacity. With that in mind, the 34-year-old should go splitter-heavy. If he can do that, the Dodgers are likely to have much weaker contact than they did in Game 2.

Yamamoto had 17 Whiffs on 56 swings, including six on his splitter and five on his curveball. I think we’ll see a similar pitch mix from him. There really isn’t much that he needs to change. He did allow 10 hard-hit balls and had a little bit of a velo drop in the middle innings, which is something to watch from a live betting standpoint.

With Thursday’s off day, both bullpens are pretty intact, which is noteworthy because we had an 18-inning game in this series. How the managers leverage their relievers will be interesting here. Does John Schneider go to his top arms if the Blue Jays are trailing late? Or will he try to save the exposure for a potential Game 7 and hope that others can keep the deficit where it is? How far does Dave Roberts push Yamamoto because even a fatigued ace is better than going to some of the very unreliable relievers that he’s had?

There are a lot of considerations to say the least. The Blue Jays have a tiny bit of wiggle room, but obviously you’d prefer not to have to use it. In terms of wagers for this one, the reasons I mentioned above make this a good game for live betting. For pregame positions, I like Gausman Over 4.5 Hits Allowed. I don’t know that he can alter his pitch mix as much as I’d like and the Dodgers are getting a second look at him. His 18.9% K% doesn’t leave much room for error and I’d expect the Dodgers to be more aggressive here, as he faced 24 batters and threw 19 of them a first-pitch fastball.

At plus money, I think it’s worth a shot given the high rate of fastballs he throws.

Pick: Kevin Gausman (TOR) Over 4.5 Hits Allowed (+108)