Today's Taste: MLB Best Bet (4/1/23)

A nice Opening Day 2-0 to kick off my first MLB season with Bet Karma. You, in fact, love to see it. Baseball has been a little (looking for the word)... terrible in the first couple of days. I suppose that’s not a big deal considering teams and players can start slow in a  162 game season. In any case, the slate for Saturday is largely uninspiring. However, one play, and one play only caught my eye.

 

Spencer Strider Over/Under 6.5 Strikeouts (-122/-104)

 

To go along with highly impressive quads, Spencer Strider drew a lot of love in the market and from bettors this offseason in regards to the NL Cy Young and to lead the MLB in strikeouts. Not to mention fantasy baseball with his mid to late second round ADP. And why not? Strider piled up 202 strikeouts in only 131.2 innings as a rookie! If you bust out your calculator, that’s a 13.8 K/9, which was easily the best in the MLB last season. But because Strider did not meet the innings requirement of 162, he didn't register as the MLB leader.

 

In three starts against the Nats last season, Strider only managed more than four punchies in one outing. That doesn’t mean much to be honest. This is a much different Washington team than last year. They have no more Juan Soto, and are firmly entrenched in rebuild mode. Plus Strider should be carrying over that tremendous finish into this year. Of his finals 15 starts in 2022, he eclipsed at least seven K’s in 11 of them. It’s a butter matchup for the best K prop of the day. No overthinking this.

 

I gave this out last night at -125, but it’s still playable up to -145. There’s even an interesting strategy to ladder him on this occasion. Because he rack up so many punchouts in so few innings, taking him on the alternate at 9+ K’s (+285) or 10+ K’s (+500) isn’t a bad sprinkle.

 

Play: Strider O6.5 K’s (-122)