On Saturday evening, two of baseball’s most exciting teams square off at the iconic Fenway Park as the Boston Red Sox host the Los Angeles Dodgers for the second leg of this interleague series. Both of these teams struggled coming out of the All-Star break but there’s still plenty of reasons to tune in this evening, so get those betting cards and your preferred streaming device ready for the action.
Here’s a Red Sox vs. Dodgers prediction and pick on DraftKings Sportsbook for Saturday’s contest.
Red Sox vs. Dodgers prediction, preview
As mentioned above, neither of these playoff-caliber squads emerged from the All-Star period in particularly impressive fashion. The Red Sox are just 2-5 with road series losses to the Chicago Cubs and Philadelphia Phillies, though we can excuse those to an extent against such high-quality competition. The Dodgers are 3-4 since the season resumed after suffering a home sweep at the hands of the Milwaukee Brewers, but they’re showing signs of a return to normalcy after winning three of their last four.
All things considered, this still presents a quality matchup between Boston at 55-50 and a 61-43 L.A. squad. Either one of these teams can make a run come playoff time with health permitting and both should load up at the trade deadline when it rolls around in a few days.
The Red Sox offense will need to wake up if they have any hopes of salvaging the potential of a series win, especially since they’re batting just .186 with a .258 OBP since the All-Star Game. They mustered up five hits in last night’s loss but were doubled up by the Dodgers’ 10 knocks behind multi-hit outings by Will Smith, Freddie Freeman and Andy Pages. Teoscar Hernandez also bashed a three-run homer in that one.
The good news for Boston is that their starter should keep things competitive for as long as he remains in the game today. Stud lefty Garrett Grochet (2.19 ERA, 1.06 WHIP, 165 SO) takes the mound against Clayton Kershaw (3.27 ERA, 1.25 WHIP, 37 SO) in a battle between a staple of the MLB’s future and an aging legend. This should be a fun one.
Red Sox vs. Dodgers pick, best bet
DraftKings Sportsbook lists the Red Sox as -144 favorites to win on the Moneyline on Saturday evening. The Dodgers are +119 underdogs on the Moneyline with a run total of 8.5.
Crochet looks like one of the best pitchers in all of baseball this season, but he also faces a tough test against this Dodgers lineup. While Los Angeles bats .232 since the All-Star Game, a mark far below their .255 average on the campaign, they’re at .250 or better over their last three games. Crochet generally limits earned runs but he has been prone to giving up a number of hits over recent starts with eight or more allowed in three of his last five outings.
If you go back a little bit further, Crochet allowed six or more hits in five of his last 10 starts dating all the way back to May 26. This pick isn’t an indictment of skill so much as a difficult matchup, but I’m going with over 5.5 hits allowed for Boston’s star against these Shohei Ohtani and the Dodgers’ assortment of big names. However, he may very well still lead the Red Sox to a win tonight.
Best bet: Garrett Crochet over 5.5 hits allowed (-115)
Click the odds on these bets to tail!
