Nine games are on the MLB slate for getaway day Thursday, as only three of them will start at 6:10 p.m. ET or later. That’s probably good for those who are more focused on the NFL Draft, as most of the baseball day will be out of the way. That being said, the Yankees and Red Sox are on Fox and FS1 tonight with a damn good pitching matchup if you are looking for something other than the draft and the NBA/NHL Playoffs.

Let’s all pour one out for the Brewers, who face Tarik Skubal today and Paul Skenes tomorrow. That’s one of the biggest notes on today’s schedule, to go along with the Braves having another prospect pitch in JR Ritchie, the Red Sox will use Payton Tolle in place of Sonny Gray, and we have the return of Christian Scott for the Mets.

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 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 23:

Chicago White Sox at Arizona Diamondbacks (-163, 8.5)

3:40 p.m. ET

Normally I try to give as much lead time as possible and this one is cutting it a little bit close, but something for us all to follow while working isn’t a bad idea. That’s because Davis Martin and Michael Soroka are both sitting on a lot of regression signs and it sure feels like the Regression Monster is lurking.

Let’s start with Martin, who has a 2.16 ERA with a 4.76 xERA, 3.50 FIP, and a 4.06 xFIP. Martin has a .258 BABIP against, which might be fairly sustainable given his .274 BABIP against last season. But, if we’re going off of career norms, I’d be very surprised if his 6.9% HR/FB% was something he could maintain. More importantly, he’s got an 86.2% LOB% with just a 20.2% K%. It’s a very big ask to maintain that sort of strand rate without getting punchies. Balls are going to start finding holes in high-leverage situations.

Over 35 PA with en on base, Martin has allowed a .176/.200/.294 slash thanks to a .192 BABIP. He’s only allowed a .154 BABIP with RISP. He’s allowed a .300 BABIP with the bases empty. So, you can see where I’m going with this. Also, his high xERA is a byproduct of his low K% coupled with a lot of hard contact against. A lot of it has been in the air as well with a Hard Hit% of 52.9% and an average exit velocity of 92.5 mph.

Then there’s Soroka, who is off to an awesome start in the K% department with 28 strikeouts over 22.2 innings of work. He has a 30.1% K% and he’s been trending up while trying to stay healthy over the last few seasons. Unlike Martin, Soroka might have some staying power to his 82.6% LOB%…

That’s if he can maintain this high K%. Right now, Soroka only has a 10.4% SwStr%. He has an 88.8% Z-Contact%. Those two metrics do not support a continuation of a 30% K%. His 18.8% CStr% is doing a lot of heavy lifting right now and opponents are letting him back into counts with just a 52.7% F-Strike%.

Soroka has also allowed his share of very hard contact with a 48.2% Hard Hit% and a 16.1% Barrel%. His K% ranks in the 85th percentile and his BB% in the 78th percentile. However, his xERA is in the 29th percentile, xBA in the 37th percentile, average exit velo in the bottom 11%, Barrel% in the bottom 5%, and Hard Hit% in the bottom 16%.

Martin’s xERA is in the 32nd percentile, xBA in the 20th percentile, average exit velo in the bottom 7%, Hard Hit% in the bottom 6%, and he’s a fly ball guy with all of those negative metrics.

Mix in a couple of bad bullpens that rank 19th (ARI) and 28th (CWS) in ERA and the potential for runs is there. It is a getaway day game and that is a concern, as Chicago goes home and Arizona has a rare Friday off day before playing in Mexico City on Saturday and Sunday against the Padres. But all the signs are there for two starters set for regression in a series where a lot of runs have been scored already. The roof will be closed today after being open the last two nights, so that’s a mild concern as well, but I’ll let the two starters and all of the numbers point me in the direction of the Over.

Pick: Over 8.5 (-115)

Pittsburgh Pirates at Texas Rangers (-163, 7.5)

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8:05 p.m. ET

The Pirates and Rangers play the final game of the day and it features Bubba Chandler and Jacob deGrom. Despite Pittsburgh’s offensive explosion yesterday, Ryan O’Hearn wasn’t really part of it, so that soured the day. I’m not sure he or the rest of his teammates will be part of much today against deGrom.

JDG is doing deGromian things as always, as he’s allowed just five runs on 15 hits in 19.2 innings with a 25/6 K/BB ratio. The veteran right-hander has only completed six innings once this season, as he was limited to 79 and 78 pitches in his first two starts after what was a bit of a light Spring Training workload. He threw 93 pitches against the Dodgers in his best start of the season and then needed 88 pitches to get 12 outs against the Mariners last time out.

But, I think this is a good spot for deGrom to bounce back and have more of the outing we would expect. For one thing, unlike Jack Leiter who got the call yesterday, deGrom does not have poor platoon splits against lefties. Quite the opposite, actually, as lefties own a career .213/.268/.340 slash against him. They’re batting just .143/.222/.286 this season after batting .186/.239/.349 last season.

Last season, deGrom posted a 2.35 ERA with a .199/.246/.323 slash and a .249 wOBA against in 88 innings and 338 plate appearances at Globe Life Field. He’s very comfortable there in what is typically a very solid pitcher’s park. Even though he’s had some problems working deep into games thus far, he’s in a good environment and this lineup should be a pretty good matchup for him, so I like Over 16.5 Outs Recorded at -106.

Chandler has allowed eight runs on 13 hits in 20 innings of work, as he’s limited the opposition to just a couple of homers and a .208 BABIP. He’s struck out 17, but also walked 13. With the K% and BB% numbers, plus a Hard Hit% of 40%, Chandler has a 4.56 xERA with his 3.15 actual ERA. He also has a 4.69 FIP. I gave a lot of thought to deGrom to record a win at +161 here and might add it to the card later. For now, just the deGrom prop.

Pick: Jacob deGrom (TEX) Over 16.5 Outs Recorded (-106)

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