Welcome to the MLB playoffs.
It's finally here: Twelve teams battling to lift the World Series trophy at the end of the season.
Eight of those 12 teams will get us going today as the four Wild Card Round series' get underway. With four games to pick from, our analysts have five bets. Although they're staying away from Diamondbacks vs. Brewers, we have three picks on Blue Jays vs. Twins to go along with bets for Rangers vs. Rays and Marlins vs. Phillies.
Here are our best bets from the MLB playoff slate on Tuesday, October 3rd.
MLB Best Bets
The team logos in the table below represent each of the matchups that our MLB betting staff is targeting from today's slate of games. Click on the team logos for any of the matchups below to navigate to a specific bet discussed in this article.
| Game | Time (ET) | Pick |
|---|---|---|
  | 3:08 p.m. | |
  | 4:38 p.m. | |
| 4:38 p.m. | |
  | 8:08 p.m. | |
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Rangers vs. Rays
By Kevin Rogers
The Rangers went from nearly winning the AL West and grabbing a free trip to the ALDS to facing the Rays in St. Pete in the best-of-three Wild Card Round.
Texas has put together an amazing season considering its big free agent signing, Jacob deGrom, couldn’t escape April before being shut down and trade deadline acquisition Max Scherzer suffered a shoulder injury in September.
One of the more underrated pickups this season was southpaw Jordan Montgomery, who was acquired from St. Louis at the trade deadline. Montgomery closed the season allowing two runs in his final four starts while the five losses Texas sustained in his outings came as a -150 favorite or higher.
The southpaw didn’t face Tampa Bay this season but allowed a total of six runs in six starts in the underdog role, while trailing only twice through five innings in 11 starts with Texas.
Tyler Glasnow is no doubt the ace of the Rays’ staff and will rack up plenty of strikeouts. Glasnow dominated the Rangers at home in early June by allowing one hit in six innings of work in an 8-3 victory.
This is a very intriguing series that can absolutely go three games, but there is value in Montgomery in the first five innings of the series opener.
Let’s back Texas in the first five and play it to +120.
Pick: Rangers F5 ML (+130) | Bet to +120
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Blue Jays vs. Twins
Kevin Gausman has averaged a 43% whiff rate on his splitter this year, and it is one of the best pitches in all of baseball. In his two starts against the Twins, though, Minnesota whiffed less than 25%, per Baseball Savant.
Minnesota saw Gausman well in both regular season meetings and also drew four or more walks in both matchups, which Gausman allowed in only one of his 29 other starts this season.
The Twins are in their better offensive split against right-handed pitching, while the Blue Jays are in their worse offensive split facing Twins ace Pablo Lopez. As good as Gausman has been this year — he finished with the second-most strikeouts in MLB — Lopez has the better underlying numbers with a 2.98 xERA and career-low 6.3% barrel rate allowed.
There's a perception that Toronto has the better offense than Minnesota this season, but these two lineups are quite comparable. In fact, the Twins had the better season-long wRC+ against right-handed pitching.
With the better starting pitcher, comparable bullpens plus lineups, and home-field advantage, I think Minnesota should be more of a favorite than the market currently projects.
I'd bet Minnesota at -120 or better to take Game 1 of this three-game series.
Pick: Twins ML (-110) | Bet to -120
Pablo Lopez may not put up eye-popping Stuff+ numbers like some of the other elite pitchers in baseball, but his command of his arsenal is one of the best in Major League Baseball. Lopez has a 107 Location+ and 109 Pitching+ rating on the season, which are both top five in baseball.
That has translated to a 2.98 xERA and incredibly low 2.23 BB/9 rate and a 10.86 K/9 rate. His splits versus righties and lefties is pretty drastic, only allowing a .260 wOBA to righties and a .327 wOBA to lefties, but the Blue Jays can really only platoon four left-handed bats and they're not exactly frightening: Brandon Belt, Daulton Varsho, Kevin Kiermaier and Cavan Biggio.
Kevin Gausman has been limping to the finish line, putting up some below-average numbers over the past few months. In the first half of the season he had a 2.93 xFIP, but the last two months his xFIP has been sitting around 3.9. The problem with Gausman is his stuff is starting to become less effective, mainly his splitter.
Gausman's Stuff+ over the past 30 days has dropped to 98 and his splitter has gone down to 90, when in the first half of the season that pitch was sitting with a 115 Stuff+ rating.
The Twins are coming into the postseason red hot offensively, ranking third in baseball over the last 30 days in wOBA and finishing the season top five against right-handed pitching.
I have the Twins projected at -137 in Game 1, so I love the value on them at -110 to take a 1-0 series lead.
Pick: Twins ML (-110)
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Blue Jays vs. Twins
By D.J. James
The Minnesota Twins hit the ball hard. They rank fifth in both hard-hit rate and average exit velocity on the season. They face Kevin Gausman, who happens to allow a lot of hard contact. Although Gausman is a solid pitcher who can rack up the strikeouts, he has a 43.3% hard-hit rate and 89.4 mph average exit velocity allowed.
The Toronto Blue Jays have several arms in relief under a 4.00 xFIP. That said, they will likely pull out all of the stops in this one once Gausman exits the game. This could happen earlier than expected.
Jordan Romano has a 4.61 xFIP over 17 innings since Aug. 1. He is walking 12.5% of batters, and the Twins have patient hitters. A nightmare could unravel for the Blue Jays in the latter innings if the Twins are hitting the ball hard and taking walks.
The Twins have a ton of injuries, but it looks like they will have the return of most of their stars: Royce Lewis, Carlos Correa, Nick Gordon. With that being the case, they would have eight active players eclipsing a .325 xwOBA, which makes up almost the entirety of the lineup. In addition, since Aug. 1, they have a 118 wRC+ and .783 OPS with an 11.4% walk rate and 26% strikeout rate off of righties.
Even if Byron Buxton is held out of the playoffs, the Twins have a good lineup. They should score against Gausman. Take the Twins’ team total over to 4 and-125.
Pick: Twins Team Total Over 3.5 (-110) | Bet to 4 (-125)
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Marlins vs. Phillies
By Tony Sartori
This line may not hang around too long as Caesars has the Phillies about 19 cents lower than the rest of the market, but I would still take it up to -165.
Chalky pick for sure, but I think the juice is worth the squeeze as Philadelphia boasts every advantage in this contest. Let's start with pitching in the Jesus Luzardo vs Zack Wheeler matchup.
Wheeler boasts a better ERA and WHIP, but it's the underlying metrics that really separate these two guys. Entering this matchup, Wheeler ranks higher than Luzardo in xERA, xBA, average exit velocity, Chase%, BB%, Barrel% and Hard-Hit%.
As many pitchers have this year, Wheeler got smacked around by Atlanta a few weeks ago. However, outside of that outing, the right-hander has allowed more than three earned runs just once over his past 14 starts.
Not only does Philly boast the pitching advantage, but it also owns the better lineup. Peaking at the right time, the Phillies rank in the top seven of the league in BA, SLG, OPS and home runs since Aug. 1. Meanwhile, over that same stretch, the Marlins do not crack the top 12 in any of those categories.
Philadelphia is more experienced and has the better lineup, starting pitcher and home-field advantage, and I'm willing to lay the juice in this spot.
Pick: Phillies ML (-150) | Bet to -165
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