MLB Betting Guide for Tuesday 10/10/23: Trusting the AL's Lower Seeds

Baseball has you covered if you want a large inventory of options to bet.

From moneylines to run totals to first-five-inning wagers, we have plenty of ways to bet the long, arduous MLB schedule daily. Outlooks can be vastly different due to starting pitchers, and a wealth of advanced stats can let us know if an individual pitcher, a bullpen, or a team is due for positive -- or negative -- regression.

Using numberFire's projections as a guide, which MLB odds from FanDuel Sportsbook are most appealing today?

Note: Lines are subject to change throughout the day after this article is published. All stats come from FanGraphs and Baseball Savant unless noted otherwise. Please check here to make sure you're seeing the most updated projections.

Houston Astros at Minnesota Twins

Twins -0.5 F5 (+102)

If there is one thing I hate, it's betting against the Houston Astros in October. Having won two titles (and appeared in four World Series') over the past six seasons, that's been a pretty rewarding strategy of late.

But this year... this year is different.

The Minnesota Twins, tied 1-1, are in a strong spot to take an early lead as action shifts back to their home ballpark.

That's largely due to the starting pitching matchup. Righty Sonny Gray gives Minnesota a huge advantage on the bump.

Gray turned in one of the best regular seasons of his career this season, posting the third-lowest ERA (2.79) in baseball, a respectable 24.3% strikeout rate, and a 48.0% groundball rate. He allowed just a .270 wOBA during the regular season and didn't miss a beat in his first postseason start since 2017.

In their 2-0 win over the Toronto Blue Jays, Gray hurled five scoreless innings, giving up five hits and two walks while striking out six.

He's in a strong spot to build off that after pitching well against Houston during the regular season. Across two starts, Gray held the 'Stros to just 3 runs and 9 hits across 13.0 innings of work. He struck out 16 -- 13 of which came in a single home outing.

I'm not expecting another double-digit strikeout game from Sonny, but I am expecting him to pitch well. The Astros were pretty lackluster against righties over the second half. From the All-Star break onward, Houston ranked 13th in wOBA (.325), 20th in ISO (.162), and 11th in wRC+ (108) -- though, they only struck out at the sixth-lowest rate (19.3%).

That's troubling for Houston's chances of winning tonight because I don't have high hopes for Cristian Javier.

The righty had a disastrous regular season that saw his ERA jump from 2.54 in 2022 to 4.56 this season. His velocity was down across the board this season -- perhaps at least a partial explanation for brutal 9.4% barrel and 26.1% groundball rates.

That velo dip really reared its head in the strikeout department. Javier struck out a career-low 23.1% of hitters as his called + swinging strike rate plummeted from 28.3% in 2022 to 25.2% this season.

Minnesota didn't get to witness Javier's fall-off firsthand, but their regular season success against righties gives me confidence they'll be more than fine against him. From the All-Star break onward, the Twins ranked in the top three in wOBA (.348), ISO (.206), and wRC+ (123) in that split.

With such a stark contrast between starters tonight, I'm more than comfortable taking the Twins to lead by at least one run after five innings. We saw how crazy things can get after the starters run their course in last night's Atlanta Braves comeback win, so I'll take the better value and ignore the bullpens with a first-five-inning wager.

Baltimore Orioles at Texas Rangers

Rangers Over 4.5 Runs (-120)

After the Baltimore Orioles and Texas Rangers combined for 19 runs in an electric Game 2, I'm hard-pressed to not expect more fireworks as the series shifts to an equally hitter-friendly venue in Arlington, Texas.

I would've been all-in on the Over 9.0 (-110) between both squads if Nathan Eovaldi didn't absolutely shove in the Wild Card round. Eovaldi was lights-out in the first half and then incredibly up and down after the All-Star break, so I genuinely don't know what to expect from him tonight.

He could go 8.0 scoreless or give up 5 in the first inning. Naturally, that kind of variance isn't something I want to bank on.

On the flip side, I have a pretty good idea of what to expect from Orioles' starter Dean Kremer and the Rangers' offense -- mediocrity and fireworks, respectively.

Kremer wasn't bad by any means during the regular season, but he isn't the dominant, No. 1 starter the Rangers should be afraid of. The righty posted a 4.12 ERA during the regular season, but had a 4.96 expected (x) ERA. A quick glance at his Baseball Savant page backs that up. Aside from limiting walks, Kremer doesn't do much above average. He didn't generate many ground balls (40.2% rate), didn't strike many hitters out (21.4%), and had suboptimal batted ball metrics (40.3% hard-hit rate and 8.9% barrel rate).

Texas, meanwhile, has absolutely shredded righties all season long. During the regular season, the Rangers ranked third in wOBA (.339), second in ISO (.195), and fourth in wRC+ (114) against right-handed pitchers. They haven't had much trouble scoring in the postseason thus far, averaging 6.25 runs per game and eclipsing 4.5 runs in two of their four games.

As a result, I'm inclined to take the Rangers to score at least 5 runs -- something they did in 89 of 162 games (54.9%) during the regular season.

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The above author is a FanDuel employee and is not eligible to compete in public daily fantasy contests or place sports betting wagers on FanDuel. The advice provided by the author does not necessarily represent the views of FanDuel. Taking the author's advice will not guarantee a successful outcome. You should use your own judgment when participating in daily fantasy contests or placing sports wagers.