Best Bets on Today's MLB Player Props Market
The 2023 MLB season is underway and VSiN has you covered with every way you can possibly bet on a baseball game. As always, Adam Burke will have daily best bets to give you some ideas of what to back when it comes to moneylines, run lines and totals. However, I'm tackling player props here, and I'm targeting MacKenzie Gore, Corey Kluber and Max Muncy on Monday, May 1st. Keep reading to find out how I'm betting on each of them.
MORE: Check out our Pro Picks page for everything our experts have on May 1
Here are our favorite MLB prop bets for Monday, May 1st:
MacKenzie Gore is off to a tremendous start for the Nationals this season, as he’s 5-3 with a 3.00 ERA and 35 strikeouts over 27.0 innings of work. Gore looks the part of a future ace in this league, and he has some of the best swing-and-miss stuff in baseball at the ripe age of 24 years old. With that in mind, we’re looking to the lefty to go out and give the Cubs some trouble on Monday.
Gore’s strikeout total sits at 6.5 for tonight and you can get the over at plus-money odds. But Gore has struck out at least seven batters in each of his last two starts, and he had 10 strikeouts against the New York Mets last Wednesday. If he can do that against a Mets team that has one of the lowest strikeout rates in baseball, he should be able to miss a lot of bats against the Cubs. Chicago has the 10th-highest strikeout rate in the league against southpaws.
Bet: Gore Over 6.5 Strikeouts (+110)
Tonight’s meeting between the Blue Jays and Red Sox has the highest total on the board, so it makes a lot of sense to attack one of the two starting pitchers. And with the way Jose Berrios is pitching lately, we’re not looking in that direction. Instead, we’re playing the over on the amount of earned runs Corey Kluber will allow for Boston.
Kluber is coming off a great start against the Baltimore Orioles last game, but he had given up at least four earned runs in three of his previous four outings heading into that one. Now, the 37-year-old righty must go out and face a Toronto team with an explosive offense. The Blue Jays are seventh in baseball in wRC+ this season, while also being ninth in OBP. This Toronto team can get hot in a hurry, and it shouldn’t surprise anyone if the Jays give Kluber a lot of trouble.
Toronto has a team batting average of .364 with 11 doubles, eight homers and 22 RBIs against Kluber in the past. A lot of these guys have hit the veteran hard in their careers.
Bet: Kluber Over 2.5 Earned Runs Allowed (-155)
Max Muncy is hitless over his last two games, but we like him to come through with at least one hit against the Phillies tonight. Muncy will get a crack at a righty in this one, as Taijuan Walker is starting this game for Philadelphia. Muncy is batting .264 with eight homers and 19 RBIs against righties this season, and he has just always done a much better job at the plate against right-handed pitching.
It should be noted that Muncy is just 1 for 11 against Walker in this career, but that’s a pretty small sample size. And Walker is coming off a game in which he gave up five earned runs over 4.0 innings against the Seattle Mariners. Walker is also due for some tougher starts soon, as his hard hit rate is way down from where it was the past two seasons.
This is just a good spot to back a player like Muncy. It isn’t often that you don’t have to lay outrageous juice on a good hitter to come through with one base hit.
Bet: Muncy Over 0.5 Hits (-155)
Did you know that you can parlay these three picks together at +468 odds? Try out our VSiN Parlay Calculator HERE!
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