Let’s grab some gambling action for Friday, including the Phillies, Blue Jays and PCA
The daily calendar says it’s a Friday, which means it’s time for another installment of bets here, or, as I like to call this little exercise, Friday Night lines.
For those who weren’t around last week, the general goal here is to find two plays for Friday, along with one home run play and a futures play. We were 1-1 on the bets last week and while that isn’t terrible, it isn’t the goal. We’re looking to go either 2-0 or hit the jackpot with a home run.
There’s a full slate of 15 games on Friday and 14 of them come at night, so we’ll focus on the night slate. All lines are from BetMGM this week.
This is a matchup of huge names, as former Cy Young winner Sandy Alcantara takes the hill for the Marlins against Phillies ace Zack Wheeler. Neither pitcher has ace numbers so far, but I’m expecting things to change here in the short term for Wheeler. He’s better than his numbers say from his last two starts and the Marlins’ offense isn’t going to end up being very good this season. It’s a good spot here for Wheeler at home, too, where he had a 2.31 ERA last year and was dominant in his only home start so far this year.
On the other side, Alcantara isn’t back to his Cy-caliber self yet in recovering from Tommy John surgery. The workhorse who led the majors in complete games in both 2022 and 2023, in addition to innings pitched in 2022, has only managed 15⅓ innings in three starts and has maxed out at 5⅔ innings with a 4.70 ERA. He’s been generally good in the first three innings, but has fallen apart after that. The Phillies have the type of powerful offense that can throw crooked numbers on the board quickly once they have a few baserunners.
More broadly speaking, the Marlins are much worse than their 8-7 start to the season would indicate, which means there was a correction coming. They were just swept at home by the Diamondbacks and that’s the start of it. The slide continues in Philadelphia this weekend.
I’ve got the Phillies winning this one by multiple runs and I love that we can get plus money on it. I’m prepared to make the same play all three games in this series, though we’ll only get plus money on this one due to the presence of Alcantara.
Blue Jays team total over 3.5 (-130)
The Blue Jays’ offense has looked better in the early going this season in terms of hitting for average and getting on base. The power just hasn’t been there from two primary sources. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. finally hit his first home run of the season last game and Bo Bichette, though h’es hitting .305 with eight doubles, doesn’t have one yet. Even in looking at Anthony Santander‘s two home runs, there’s room for a surge or two in here.
The Blue Jays are still averaging 4.5 runs per game at home.
Mariners starter Bryan Woo has a 2.62 career ERA at home while it’s 4.08 on the road. He’s been brilliant in his two home starts this season while allowing four runs in six innings in his road start and that was in a pitcher’s paradise in San Francisco. He’ll still miss some bats, but the Blue Jays can square him up, just as they did in 2023 and that even came in Seattle.
Bonus: The Mariners’ bullpen worked hard and had a rough series in Cincinnati and there wasn’t a day off.
Home run play: Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (+500)
Guerrero has only seen Woo for three plate appearances in his career, but one of them was a home run in Seattle. He just went 18 games and 81 plate appearances before hitting his first home run of the year and that came against Spencer Strider. When Vlad gets hot, they can come in bunches, such as late June last season when he clubbed six homers in nine games. I’m pouncing right here. Take us home, Vladdy.
Bonus home run play: All the lefties in Wrigley
The one day game is the Diamondbacks at Cubs in Chicago and the wind is absolutely screaming out. There are two right-handers on the mound and the park has become much better for lefties than righties at the plate in recent years. If you like home run props, take a look at the likes of Corbin Carroll, Josh Naylor, Kyle Tucker, Michael Busch and Pete Crow-Armstrong.
Oh, speaking of …
Futures play: Pete Crow-Armstrong to lead MLB in SB +1100
Only a sprinkle here, please, because the favorite remains Elly De La Cruz and he’s most likely going to finish at the top. There’s a reason he’s only +105.
Crow-Armstrong is really showing something, though. He’s only one stolen base off the lead with seven so far. The Cubs lead the majors in stolen bases, so it’s obviously going to be part of their game this year. Crow-Armstrong is batting seventh, so it’s not like he’s in a spot where you’re worried about him running into an out with Kyle Tucker at the plate or something. It’s a prime area to run and get into scoring position for the bottom of the order. He was 27 for 30 in steals last season in only 410 plate appearances and that was with a .286 on-base percentage. He’s at a .310 OBP right now and starting to look better at the plate. Plus, he’s so good at defense and baserunning, the Cubs are never gonna bench him. He’s played every inning of the Cubs’ 21 games heading into Friday.
Again, don’t go crazy on the number of units here, but that plus-1100 is a big number and there’s a real chance Pete brings this one home.
