MLB DW Slate Preview - May 22
My rundown of today's MLB slate, including full projections and analysis for each game
It’s a lighter Thursday slate, and it starts at noon, so I’ve gotta get moving here! I’m cramming in everything for the day to one slate preview post. Let’s get to it.
Money Matchups
Padres vs. Bowden Francis
Francis has a 6.49 FIP this year. That doesn’t tell you the whole story, because he has suffered from an extremely high HR/FB, and that is shown by his xFIP being much better at 4.63. But it’s still an awful number. He’s been very bad as a starter this year. An 18% K% with a 2.7 HR/9. I think both of those things can improve, but I’m confident it’s not going to work well against this Padres lineup.
Fernando Tatis Jr., Manny Machado, and Jackson Merrill are in particularly good spots here. They have handled the stuff that Francis has marvelously well over the last few years:
The Padres grade out as my algorithm’s #1 offense on the board today. I’d recommend betting on the offense to score runs as a whole, and it’s also a fantastic spot for those three stud hitters I mentioned above.
Carlos Rodon vs. Rangers
It’s hard to put any faith or money in Rodon given his inconsistent nature. But this is a great spot for him. The Rangers’ bats do not grade out well at all against pitchers like Rodon, and we can see that in the matchups data here:
