So my target bet was McLain for a strikeout, but he wasn’t in the lineup. So I ended up with this one:
The bet was cashed in the first inning. It was a weird game.
So that win turned our $25 into $36.55 total. We roll that into today!
It’s a big-time pitching matchup with Chase Burns taking on Braxton Ashcraft.
Burns and Ashcraft squared off against each other in their first start of the year
→ Burns: 5 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 7 SO, 3 BB
→ Ashcraft: 6 IP, 4 H, 2 ER, 3 SO, 4 BB
Lots of walks there! But it was the first outing. Ashcraft has an 8.7% BB% this year, and Burns is at 8.8%. Both of these teams are in the top ten in the league in team walk rate (CIN = 10.5%, PIT = 10.3%).
Here’s the matchup model:
First thing my eyes go to:
→ BRANDON LOWE 20.4% SWSTR%
Conversely, there’s not a lot of SwStr% on the Reds side. Ashcraft is coming off of his worst start of the year, and I had serious suspicious about the strikeout ability he was showing prior to that.
I’d be inclined toward the Ashcraft Under 5.5 K (+104) and the Burns Over 6.5 K (-108), but that’s too risky for this particular exercise we’re doing.
I’m not trying to flip a coin heads four times in a row. I want to stack up “easy” wins and just see if we can make it 6-8 in a row before something super weird happens and it crashes.
So I know I want this one as part of it:
And I’m spotting one that I like the price on. It’s Chase Burns more strikeouts thrown than Braxton Ashcraft (-188).
Burns is the better strikeout pitcher, clearly, and it’s a better strikeout matchup, clearly. I don’t think -188 is enough juice on this one.
So here it is, we put our $36.55 on it to try to get us up to $63.62.
Give this post a “like” if you’re tailing along! If I’m talking to myself, I’ll stop!