The San Francisco Giants dropped last night’s home game to the Kansas City Royals 3-1 thanks to seven scoreless innings from Kris Bubic and a two-run homer by Vinnie Pasquantino. Tonight, they look to bounce back at Oracle Park and get back into the win column.
Here’s a Giants vs. Royals prediction and pick on DraftKings Sportsbook for tonight’s action.
Giants vs. Royals prediction, preview
At 28-20, the Giants remain one of the MLB’s better teams and one of the best when playing at home with a 16-8 record at their own park. Last night’s outing was a bit rough as no player logged multiple hits, and Bubic dominated by only allowing two himself through his seven innings of work. The Giants hold a 12-7 record after losses this season, though, so they can certainly be expected to make things competitive in tonight’s rematch. However, they’re 4-6 across their last 10 contests, so form isn’t exactly on their side.
The Royals now sit 27-22 and 5-5 over their last 10 games. Last night’s win was another low-scoring affair, which seems like the norm for this Kansas City team as they fall 27th in runs scored, just four ahead of the Chicago White Sox. Since they fall in the bottom-12 teams in AVG, OBP, and OPS, the Royals have to wake up the bats if they have hopes of competing for a real playoff run. For the time being, they’re doing fine leaning on their pitching staff for success.
Giants vs. Royals pick, best bet
San Francisco once again enters as Moneyline favorites with -148 odds to win and +145 odds of covering the -1.5 run line. Kansas City comes in as +124 Moneyline favorites, longer odds than last night’s game, with -175 odds of covering the run line. With a game total of eight runs, that line looks a little higher than yesterday’s did.
Hayden Birdsong rejoins the Giants’ rotation as the starter tonight, his first starting nod of the season after spending the opening months in the bullpen. He pitched to the tune of a 2.33 ERA across 11 starts last season, and he’s tallied a 2.31 ERA, 1.29 WHIP, and 25 strikeouts across 23.1 innings this year. Whether the righty can shoulder a starter’s workload remains to be seen in a full-season sample, but he should be solid tonight.
As for the Royals’ starter, veteran right-hander Michael Lorenzen takes the mount this evening. He’s thrown 52.2 innings on the campaign with a 3.76 ERA and 1.23 ERA to go with 45 strikeouts to show for it. He’s allowed at least seven hits and four earned runs in two of his last three games, though, so he’ll hope for better results this time around.
This feels like a great opportunity for Heliot Ramos to have a big outing. He’s batted .465 with 20 hits in 43 at-bats over the last 15 days, and with a .305 average against right-handed pitching this season, I like the Giants’ hit leader to pop off in this one against an inconsistent Lorenzen.
Best bet: Heliot Ramos 2+ Hits (+200)
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