Through roughly 100 games of the season, plenty of divisions are shaping up for fascinating stretch runs. Only in the AL Central does any team have more than a five-game lead, and even the Detroit Tigers are floundering, losing 10 of their last 11 games.
In the last two-plus months of the season, hitters will provide the highlights, but starting pitchers will often be the unsung heroes. Here are my three favorite starting pitcher prop bets for tonight’s games at DraftKings Sportsbook.
Best Starting Pitcher Prop Bets on DraftKings Sportsbook
Keider Montero 6+ Hits Allowed (-105)
Detroit’s collapse in its last 11 games has given the Toronto Blue Jays the best record in the MLB, and as the two teams play the second game of a four-game series tonight, Toronto has the clear pitching advantage and the far hotter offense. Since the All-Star break, the Blue Jays have slashed .309/.376/.506, for a league-leading .885 OPS and a 6-1 record. José Berríos, as inconsistent he has been, is a more trustworthy option than Montero, who has just a 32nd percentile expected batting average this season.
This prop bet really depends on how many innings the 25-year-old lasts. In three of the four outings in which he’s given up six or more hits, he’s completed the fifth inning. Given that no Tigers pitcher has completed the sixth inning since the All-Star break besides Tarik Skubal, I’d venture that Montero’s leash will be fairly long tonight, allowing the Blue Jays to impart more damage. He’ll also be aided by the fact that Toronto has averaged the fifth fewest pitches per plate appearance this season.
MacKenzie Gore Race to 3 Strikeouts (+125)
This bet isn’t so much about Gore as it is the fact that I really don’t trust Minnesota Twins starter Zebby Matthews. In 14 starts over the last two seasons, he’s posted a 6.53 ERA, and those numbers haven’t been skewed by a couple of horrendous starts; he’s just been consistently pretty bad. Sure, there are some things to like about the 25-year-old — he has a respectable 3.27 FIP this season, and, more pertinent to this prop, would have a top-sextile strikeout rate if he’d thrown enough innings to qualify — but I’m going to fade him against a Washington Nationals team that has struck out at the league’s seventh-lowest rate.
Gore, meanwhile, has thrown enough innings to qualify and has an 89th-percentile strikeout rate. He already induces chases at an 83rd-percentile clip, and that could be buoyed even further tonight against a Minnesota offense that chases more frequently than the average team. The Twins also whiff and strike out at above-average rates, especially in the first inning, when they’ve struck out 118 times in 423 plate appearances. Minnesota has also struck out on 24.1% of its plate appearances against left-handers and only 21.7% of its plate appearances against righties.
