MLB Picks Today: Baseball Best Bets, Predictions, Odds on DraftKings Sportsbook for September 8

Full disclosure: I woke up at like 4:30 a.m. ET to watch Canada play in the FIBA World Cup, so I’m a little groggy. Will a lack of sleep impact my ability to accurately predict MLB games? Probably. But to be honest, a full night’s rest hasn’t helped much since the All-Star break, either. That’s baseball, Suzyn.

We’ve got a full slate on the diamond today. Let’s dive in.

New York Mets at Minnesota Twins

While I never want to oversimplify a bet, a lean towards the Mets just means you happened to notice the starting pitching matchup for this game. On one side, we have Kodai Senga. Since the beginning of July, the rookie RHP has posted a 2.48 ERA and a 2.79 FIP. In this 10 start stretch, Senga has been able to maintain an elite strikeout rate (30.5%), yet he’s also cut his walk rate to a far more manageable 8.5%. For the sake of comparison, Senga’s walk rate was 13.5% across the first three months of the season. Understandably, this level of success has put Senga in a very exclusive class of pitcher, as the only two qualified NL arms with a lower FIP since July 1 are Spencer Strider and Freddy Peralta. Good company.

On the other side? Well, let’s all welcome Dallas Keuchel back into our lives. The former Cy Young award winner has made five appearances for Minnesota since being called up from Triple-A and the results have been underwhelming to say the least. Though Keuchel has done a nice job of negating hard contact and launch angle, he’s posted a 5.91 xERA almost solely based on the fact that his 8.6% strikeout rate looks like a site error on FanGraphs. The left-hander owns a 6.23 ERA since the beginning of 2021 — a span of 244.0 innings. We have more than enough evidence to say Keuchel is washed.

Kyle Harrison hasn’t looked amazing since making his long-awaited MLB debut a couple weeks back, but he certainly passes the eye test. While the rookie has surrendered his fair share of hard contact in his three appearances with the Giants, he’s also registered a 32.8% strikeout rate and a 13.8% swinging strike rate. Again, it’s not difficult to see why the 22-year-old lefty with an upper-90s fastball is thought of so highly in prospect circles. I’d expect Harrison to thrive on Friday, as he draws a matchup with the lowly Rockies, a lineup that sits dead-last in wRC+ versus LHPs (64) and wRC+ when on the road (76).

Colorado will send its own southpaw to the hill this evening, yet that’s about where Ty Blach’s similarities with Harrison end. Blach’s managed to survive the last six weeks in the Rockies’ rotation, but his underlying numbers are various shades of red flags. In fact, Blach possesses a 6.18 xERA in 2023 and his opponent zone contact rate of 93.7% is the highest of any pitcher who’s thrown at least 50.0 innings. Basically, if it weren’t for Colorado’s complete inability to develop pitching talent, Blach would be nowhere near an MLB mound. The Rockies loss should be San Francisco’s gain.

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I am a promoter at DraftKings and am also an avid fan and user (my username is theglt13) and I may sometimes play on my personal account in the games that I offer advice on. Although I have expressed my personal view on the games and strategies above, they do not necessarily reflect the view(s) of DraftKings and I may also deploy different players and strategies than what I recommend above. I am not an employee of DraftKings and do not have access to any non-public information.