Two of the MLB’s elite offenses meet again tonight at hitter-friendly Coors Field, setting up a high-scoring affair between the Washington Nationals and Colorado Rockies. Game two of this series is set for 8:40 p.m. ET.
Let’s dive in with a preview, prediction and pick for tonight’s Nationals vs. Rockies game, courtesy of odds and lines on DraftKings Sportsbook.
Nationals vs. Rockies prediction, preview
This series began last night with a 7-3 win for the Nats powered by a 3-for-5 outing from Curtis Mead, a three-run homer by Andres Chaparro and another home run by CJ Abrams. The visitors posted 12 hits on the evening to just six for the home side, so we’ve already seen some offensive fireworks here.
With the win, Washington moved to 51-50 on the year to stay above .500 and push the run differential to +19. On the other hand, it’s no surprise to see Colorado still at the bottom of the standings with a 40-62 record and a -94 differential of its own.
Tonight, the Nationals start young LHP Carson Palmquist, who has struggled in his first few games of the season. He has six appearances with three starts, tossing 9.2 innings over this sample with a 6.52 ERA and a 1.45 WHIP. He also has 12 strikeouts with a 27.9% K%, though the sample size remains quite small. The bullpen should see extra work here behind him, but he did go 3.1 and 3.0 innings in two of his starts thus far. As for those relievers, they’re 28th in ERA at 5.12 with a 1.48 WHIP and an 8.5% K-BB%.
For the Rockies, it may be a tough night as veteran RHP Michael Lorenzen starts with a 3-9 record in 21 games (20 starts). He brings a 6.22 ERA to the table with a 1.77 WHIP, striking out just 73 hitters in 97.0 IP. No NL pitchers has allowed more hits this season and only two other NL arms have allowed more earned runs; if you look at the Statcast page, there’s a lot of blue. The bullpen slots in at 26th in ERA with a 4.91 mark, plus a 1.47 ERA and a 10.5% K-BB%.
Now, the bats should have a fantastic time. The Nationals remain the highest-scoring group in the MLB with 5.47 runs per game on the third-best OPS (.766). They’re leading the entire league in ISO (.188), homers (147) and slugging (.440), also pacing the sport in composite speed score (5.7). Against right-handers, they get the lesser of their splits but still slash .244/.318/.437 for a .756 OPS. For the Rockies, the numbers aren’t quite as elite but are still excellent overall — they’re ninth in runs per game (4.77), fifth in OPS (.745), 11th in ISO (.165) and 17th in homers (116). This is another formidable unit, no doubt.
Nationals vs. Rockies pick, best bet
DraftKings Sportsbook lists the Nationals as -114 Moneyline favorites on the road tonight with the Rockies behind as slight underdogs at -105. The run total sits at an astounding 13 combined runs.
Well, what’s the top pick for tonight? It’s tempting to take the over on the game total or even look at the team total of 6.5 runs for the Nationals since they have such a favorable matchup against Lorenzen. No shade to the guy, but he has an average exit velocity in the 12th percentile with a fifth-percentile hard-hit rate, producing an extremely high WHIP of 2.04 with a staggering 7.78 ERA at home. Somehow, he’s served up just six homers in those nine starts but still allowed 36 earned runs across the 41.2 IP at Coors. The batting average against him? It’s .250 with a .969 OPS from opponents.
Washington is going to demolish this guy, and the bullpen behind him isn’t great either. I fully expect the visitors to put up a ton of runs, but I’d actually rather get the over on 11.5 total hits for the team at +105 odds. Likewise, the run line of -1.5 for the Nats also looks tasty here, so pick your poison among the options but just keep the picks on this team.
