Sitting at 8-6 on the season for +2.38 units, Dalton Brown is back with a pair of plus-money bets for Thursday's MLB slate.
By Dalton Brown
3:45 p.m. ET: Pittsburgh Pirates at San Francisco Giants: PIrates First 5 Innings moneyline (+120) at BetRivers
Mitch Keller as a first-five-inning underdog to Alex Wood? Yes, please, and I'd play this up to Pirates -125.
Pittsburgh and San Francisco will finish up their three-game set by the Bay with a matinee Wednesday afternoon at Oracle Park, and I'm backing the Bucs to take a lead into the late innings. Mitch Keller has been excellent this season, posting a 3.03 xERA and 45 strikeouts alongside just four walks in May. We are probably getting a better number than we should because of Keller's poor outing in Seattle last time out, but I'm more than willing to chalk that up to the righty pitching with a huge lead - and he cashed us a plus-money bet then, too.
Lefty Alex Wood will start for San Francisco, fresh off of an outing that saw him walk five batters. He's posted a pedestrian 4.60 ERA in May, and should yield more than enough runs to the Pirates' offense for Keller to take us home a winner.
We are getting the much better starting pitcher here in a matchup of two pretty evenly-matched lineups, and plus-money odds are a bonus. San Francisco's bullpen ranks second in baseball in ERA in May, though, so keep it to the first five innings.
7:07 p.m. ET: Milwaukee Brewers at Toronto Blue Jays: Brewers First 5 Innings moneyline (+188) at BetRivers
We are taking an even bigger plus-money shot here with Milwaukee, and I think it is warranted given what we've seen from Alek Manoah this season.
The heavy-set righty has pitched to a 6.42 xERA this season, and his 6.45 mark in May isn't exhibiting any signs of improvement. He's allowed five or more runs in three of his five starts in May, and Milwaukee is a much better offense against right-handed pitching (95 wRC+ vs. 69 wRC+ against lefties). The Brew Crew aren't the Oakland A's, so I cannot comprehend offering close to 2-to-1 against Manoah over the first five innings.
On the flip side, Julio Teheran will take the mound for the Brewers - and while I'm not endorsing Teheran as the top-end starter he once was, he was solid in his first start of 2023 (5 innings, 1 earned run, 4 hits, 1 walk) and we likely won't need a virtuoso performance to cash given what we've seen from Manoah. Playing a righty against Toronto's fearsome offense is never fun, but this spot calls for it.