Happy Labor Day! If you’re off work today, there’s no better way to celebrate than with some MLB baseball across the 13-game slate. At 6:40 p.m. EST, the San Diego Padres (76-61) host the Baltimore Orioles (61-76) at Petco Park in tonight’s evening window. The matchup marks the first leg of a three-game series.
Here’s a Padres vs. Orioles prediction and pick on DraftKings Sportsbook for Monday’s game.
Padres vs. Orioles prediction, preview
The Padres keep chasing the division-leader Dodgers out in the NL West, but they’re at least locked in with a Wild Card spot at the moment with a three-game cushion. With plenty left to play for, every game counts for the Friars, a bit of a different story compared to tonight’s opponent. The Orioles are far behind the Wild Card chase at 12 games back and continue to tumble at 2-8 across their last 10 games. That includes a couple of absolute drubbings by the Giants which saw O’s losses of 15-8 and 13-2.
San Diego has the upper hand by a significant margin tonight. They ranked eighth in average (.259), 10th in OPS (.748) and 11th in runs (137) in August, showing much improvement at the plate with a couple of lineup acquisitions from the Trade Deadline. The Padres still don’t hit many homers with just 27 last month, which ranked 26th, but they demonstrate excellent process at the dish inside the top-seven in walks drawn with the third-fewest strikeouts. Their pitching staff has performed well this year and even a slight downtick to ninth in ERA (3.97) didn’t hold the Padres back too much since they still ranked second in WHIP (1.14) last month.
It’s a significant difference from the Orioles, a team which sold off assets and sent Ramon Laureano and Ryan O’Hearn to this same Padres team back on July 31. In August, Baltimore ranked 26th in average and OPS (.228 and .671) while sitting just 23rd in runs (113). They also struck out the fourth-most of any team while showing a similar lack of pop with 28 homers on the month. The pitching staff fell 15th in ERA (4.13) and 13th in WHIP (1.26), both improvements from their results through the full season’s sample.
Padres vs. Orioles pick, best bet
DraftKings Sportsbook lists the Padres as -158 favorites on the Moneyline while the Orioles hold +129 odds of an upset. The run total sits at just 7.5.
San Diego starts Dylan Cease (4.82 ERA, 1.33 WHIP, 183 SO), who excels at striking down batters but hasn’t limited runs very well, especially as of late. He duels Kyle Bradish, who made his first start of the year back on August 26 after returning from Tommy John surgery. He ended his day with four hits (two homers) and two earned runs allowed in six innings, striking out 10 in the process.
Bradish looked sharp in his season debut, especially against a Red Sox batting order with its fair share of talent. However, the Baltimore bullpen ranks near the bottom of the MLB with a 4.66 ERA and 1.43 WHIP. The Padres can take advantage of that, and it’s a bit difficult to trust Bradish to begin with despite the strong season debut since he experienced such a long layoff. With the talent difference between these lineups and Cease’s strikeout potential against a swing-happy O’s team, I actually like the Padres to cover today a +138.
Best bet: SD Padres -1.5 (+138)
Click the odds on this bet to tail!
