St. Louis are sending right-handed pitcher Sonny Gray to the mound as the team is in Miami to begin their series against the Marlins. With Miami striking out at a high rate against right-handed pitchers lately, we’ll look for Gray to rack up strikeouts in tonight’s matchup. Let’s get to our best MLB prop bet today!
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Best MLB Prop Bet Today | Sonny Gray
In his first year with the Cardinals, Sonny Gray is having a career year. In 68.2 innings (12 starts), he has a low 3.12 xERA (career best and 79th percentile in the league), an even lower 2.58 xFIP (career best), very high 33% SO rate (11.93 per nine, career best, up from 24.3% last year and 95th percentile), impressive 31.5% CSW%, and 12.5% Swinging-Strike% (also career best).
Gray strikes out batters from both sides of the plate at a healthy clip (35.1% of righties and 30.5% of lefties) and is usually good for five to six innings, though he does need to be efficient given his modest pitch count (throws around 85-90 pitches. As for today’s strikeout prop (6.5), Gray went over it in six out of the last 10 starts, including in three of the last five.
Notably, Gray is projected for 24%-25% SO rate for the year by season-long projections, so he should see a dramatic decrease to his SO rate moving forward. With that being said, a matchup against the struggling, strikeout-happy Marlins is a great opportunity for Gray to continue his elite form for at least one more start.
Miami has the ninth highest collective strikeout rate against right-handed pitchers in the last month of baseball (24.2%, 592 plate appearances) and the fourth highest over the last two weeks (25.8%, 244 plate appearances). Today’s expected lineup includes six batters that strike out at or above the average rate against right-handed pitchers this year, above all Tim Anderson (R, 29.3%), Jake Burger (R, 27.6%), and Bryan De La Cruz (R, 26.3%).
Pinnacle has the over at -140, and given Gray’s rates, recent form, and the plethora of strikeout candidates up and down Miam’s expected lineup, getting -115 for him to record seven or more strikeouts in tonight’s matchup is quite appealing.
Best MLB Prop Bet Today: Sonny Gray Over 6.5 Strikeouts (-115 at BetRivers)
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