We’re back to having a full slate on Wednesday and also have a bunch of day games to wrap up this round of series. Eight of the 15 games start at 1:40 p.m. ET or earlier, with a couple more in the 2 p.m. hour. With the timing of this article and the goal to have some lead time for readers, a day like today really cuts down the options, even starting it the day before.

So, I’m only looking at the 2 p.m. ET or later games, with more of a focus towards the later first pitches. We only have four games on Thursday, so that’ll be a lighter day for everybody if you’re feeling the crunch of capping an early card on Wednesday.

I’ll be posting my daily best bets Monday-Saturday with a Sunday Night Baseball preview on Sunday, as all the day games make it tough to get something out with lead time out here in Las Vegas. All lines are from DraftKings and are current at the time of publish. Please take the initiative to SHOP AROUND for the best odds. It matters. A lot.

One new offering this baseball season is our Opta AI Player Prop Projections. They are available to everybody now, but will soon be for VSiN Pro Subscribers only, so you can check out our current offers here. Zachary Cohen will be using those projections and his own handicapping to write up MLB player props.

Greg Peterson will have his best bets posted the night before and you can also check out his daily lines to see what looks to be off-market. Steve Makinen has also released his updated Bullpen Betting Systems and DraftKings Splits Systems, plus he’ll have a daily analytics report.

Feel free to use my opinions and thoughts, as well as our suite of MLB Betting Tools, including the DraftKings and Circa Betting Splits, Steve Makinen’s Daily Ratings, Greg Peterson’s Daily Lines, the 1st 5 Innings Analyzer, and Umpire Stats. Check out our new MLB tools powered by Ballpark Pal: Strikeout Projections, Park Factors, and YRFI Report.

That’s a lot of coverage and we’ll be doing it all season long. We’re happy to have you along for the ride.

Here are the MLB best bets today for April 1:

New York Yankees at Seattle Mariners (-118, 7)

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4:10 p.m. ET

The Yankees and Mariners wrap up their series with a Wednesday matinee at T-Mobile Park and it’ll be another good pitching matchup. After getting Max Fried vs. Logan Gilbert last night, we get Cam Schlittler vs. George Kirby today.

I am concerned about the Yankees wrapping up the road trip and heading home for some Friday festivities against the Marlins,  but hopefully they stay engaged and locked in here against a tough customer in Kirby. The 28-year-old right-hander went six innings and allowed just a solo HR to Chase DeLauter in his first start against Cleveland. He struck out six and walked a couple. But, I’ll be honest, a better offense, like New York’s for example, may have taken better advantage than the Guardians did.

Kirby only had an 8.9% SwStr% and got zero Whiffs on his curveball. The gameplan was to throw a lot of high fastballs at the Guardians throughout the series and it worked, but the Yankees have better hitters and better power bats. Furthermore, based on Statcast data, Kirby’s fastball was straighter than normal. His vertical movement was consistent with 2025, but his horizontal movement was down from last season. 

Kirby threw his fastball 45.6% of the time, a big uptick from last season’s 28.8% usage. Some of that had to do with the matchup, as Cleveland loaded the lineup with lefties. Kirby goes to more of a sinker/slider mix against RHB, but didn’t have to utilize that much against Cleveland. Still, I do wonder if he’ll have a feel for it.

Meanwhile, Schlittler had it all working against the Giants in his first start. He had a 48.6% Chase Rate and an 18.8% SwStr% while throwing nearly 71% first-pitch strikes. This is an upgrade in opposition for him as well, but the Mariners have struck out a ton thus far and have really only been able to score via the long ball. Schlittler only allowed eight homers in 73 regular season innings and zero in 14.1 postseason innings.

He only allowed two hard-hit balls in that start against the Giants and saw noteworthy Stuff+ bumps on his fastball and sinker. Kirby actually saw a Stuff+ drop on both his fastball and curveball. Small sample sizes, and it may not mean much of anything, but Schlittler’s stuff did look much more explosive in his first start than Kirby’s did.

I like the Yankees here, as I prefer Schlittler to Kirby, the NY lineup to the SEA lineup in the current state for each, and the Mariners pen has had a few issues late in games thus far.

Pick: Yankees -102

Minnesota Twins (-120, 8.5) at Kansas City Royals

7:40 p.m. ET

This game will probably get rained out, but I wanted to write it up with some thoughts on Joe Ryan and Noah Cameron. Ryan was excellent in his 2026 debut, holding the Orioles to just one hit with seven strikeouts and two walks on Opening Day. Cameron will be making his first start of the season.

It really was a strong showing for Ryan, even with a pretty big arsenal change, as he threw his curveball at a 16.5% clip, a big uptick from last season when it was barely a weapon. Ryan didn’t really use the sweeper that was his second-most popular pitch last season. We’ll see if that was a concerted usage change or just something based on the matchup against the Orioles. It was a pretty right-handed-heavy Orioles lineup that he faced and all 10 splitters he threw were to right-handed batters.

It seems like the usage caught the Orioles off-guard, but it should be noted that Ryan allowed a 30% Pull Air% and a .406 xSLG on the fastballs that the Orioles did put in play. It was only five of them, but they had an average exit velo of 93.3 mph. Ryan’s fastball actually had a lot less horizontal movement than last season, while having similar vertical movement. The Royals are a lot more familiar with Ryan’s pitch shapes and his arsenal, which I think will bring more success against him.

This is also the type of matchup where the outfield dimension changes could come into play, as Ryan had a 70% flyball rate in that first start.

Cameron had an awful spring. The southpaw came into the season as a regression candidate anyway with a 2.99 ERA, 4.08 xERA, and a 4.18 FIP last season over 138.1 innings of work. His 84% LOB% and .241 BABIP did a lot of heavy lifting. In the spring, Cameron allowed 11 runs on 22 hits, including four homers, and only had a 9/4 K/BB ratio. He needed 80 pitches to get 13 outs in his final spring tune-up against MLB hitters.

He allowed a 42.9% Hard Hit% with a 10.7% Barrel%, which would be big increases from both numbers last season, two numbers that allowed him to keep his BABIP low. The most concerning thing for me, though, is that Cameron’s velo was down on most of his pitches, especially the fastball. Between the bigs and Triple-A, Cameron threw 171 innings last season. His previous high was 128.2, so it was a pretty big increase and featured a lot more high-stress pitches.

Cameron allowed a .233 BA on fastballs last season with a .286 xBA and a .473 SLG with a .550 xSLG. He’s not a guy who will benefit from the park changes at all. Take a tick off the fastball and that’s an even greater problem, especially for a guy with below average Extension.

The Royals bullpen is better than the Twins bullpen, so even though my fears about Cameron outweigh my fears about Ryan, I’m not taking Minnesota. I also like the KC lineup more. But, I do think we could get some runs in this ballgame, as Cameron is probably due for a somewhat early exit, bringing some low-leverage arms in for the Royals, who have already shuffled the deck without Carlos Estevez. The Minnesota pen looks very weak on paper and has struggled early.

Pick: Twins/Royals Over 8.5 (-102)

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