Kansas City…we have a problem. It’s not the Royals’ record, which stands at a solid 29-27, though fourth in the stacked AL Central, and it’s also not the pitching staff, which has combined for the league’s second-best ERA. The problem is that Kansas City just can’t hit, ranking fifth-to-last in OPS, dead last in home runs, and third-to-last in runs. The Royals have scored just six combined runs in the first two games of their series against the Cincinnati Reds.
The series finale is tonight at 7:40 p.m. ET at Kauffman Stadium. The offensive struggles have extended even to last year’s MVP runner-up, Bobby Witt Jr., who’s hitless in seven at-bats so far this series.
Kansas City is a 1.5-run underdog at DraftKings Sportsbook and the total is set for 7.5. Below, I’ve highlighted my favorite prop bets centered around Witt.
Best Bobby Witt Jr. Prop Bets on DraftKings Sportsbook
Bobby Witt Jr. 1+ Doubles (+300)
Unfortunately for the Royals, their offensive prognosis tonight is fairly grim. The Reds will start Hunter Greene, a flamethrower who has been elite this season, combining triple-digits fastball velocity with just a 5.2% walk rate. Greene has given up three or fewer hits in each of his past three starts, so I almost backed Witt to go hitless for the third straight game (+190 odds). However, Witt hasn’t had three straight hitless games at any point this season and had only one such stretch in 2024, when he won the batting title. Instead, I settled on doubles, given that he leads all of the major leagues with 20 doubles and has had a double in 19 of his 56 games. That ratio should imply +194 odds, making this +300 line excellent value.
Some of that discrepancy can be explained by Greene’s talent; the one-time All-Star has only given up seven doubles all season. But Greene has gotten fairly lucky, with a 3.35 FIP that is far worse than his 2.54 ERA and an expected slugging percentage .026 worse than opponents’ actual mark. While he ranks in the top quintile in seven of the 13 Statcast categories, he’s prone to the occasional big hit, ranking in just the 34th percentile in hard-hit percentage, the 36th in average exit velocity, and the 19th in barrel rate. Plus, of the eight home runs he’s conceded, only five would’ve gone out in Kauffman Stadium, making them more likely to be doubles tonight. Witt ranks in the 89th percentile in average exit velocity and he’s only had four hits that would’ve gone out at tonight’s venue.
Bobby Witt Jr. 1st Plate Appearance – In Play Out (+110)
Witt combines an aggressive approach — he swings at 51.7% of all pitches, the 27th-highest rate among 169 qualified hitters — with an above-average contact rate, so he’s a good bet to get the ball in play in any given plate appearance. He has struck out on 18.0% of his plate appearances and gotten on base in a further 35.1%, leaving the remaining 46.9% as in-play outs (with a negligible chance at either a hit by pitch or a sacrifice). That in itself would imply that +113 odds are appropriate for any given plate appearance, but that’s before accounting for the fact that Greene has allowed just a .218 batting average on balls in play, which would be the league’s third-best figure if he’d pitched enough innings to qualify. Witt’s first-inning OBP is slightly higher than his overall mark, but Greene has allowed just a .056 batting average on balls in play in the first inning, so those factors cancel each other out.
