MLB Betting Trends: Roll With the Tampa Bay Rays As Long As You Can
With a sample size of 141 MLB games played, a few more betting trends are starting to emerge. These are very early observations – since a full season will give us nearly 2,500 games – but betting is often about streaks, and there are a few that we should get on board with while we can!
Here are four observations from the first 10 days of Major League Baseball:
1. The Tampa Bay Rays are good.
Like, really good. They are so good that not only have they won nine games in a row and are the only undefeated team in MLB, they have won each of their games by a margin of four runs or more. They have outscored their opponents by a whopping 57 runs. For reference, the last time a team had a run differential of more than 50 was 1884 (St. Louis Maroons and New York Gothams).
Nathan Ray Seebeck/USA Today Sports
Bettors who have taken the Rays on the run line have cashed every time. It’s currently an auto-play until they prove otherwise. Yes, one day someone will get lucky and cash on a big payout for the underdog, but I’ll be rolling with the Rays until that time.
2. Is Patrick Corbin or Jose Berrios pitching? Take the over.
Patrick Corbin finished last season with an ERA of 6.31. To start this year, it’s 8.00. To be fair, he did face the Tampa Bay Rays last week (we took the over on that game and cashed easily), but going back to last season, he hasn’t allowed fewer than four runs in a game since September 20 -- and he only pitched 1.2 innings in that game.
Jose Berrios has picked up right where he left off last season. Berrios has been shelled for 14 runs across 10.2 innings pitched this year and now has an ERA of 11.17. Last year, he finished with a 5.12 ERA and he doesn’t seem to have made the right adjustments. Add to that the fact that his Blue Jays team can put up a ton of offense on any given day, and Berrios day becomes an auto-play for the over.
3. Speaking of over…
Seventy-eight games have hit the over (57.4%) this year as compared to 58 games with the under (42.6%). Offense is up around the league, with an average of 4.69 runs per game this year as compared to 4.28 in 2022. When in doubt, go over – especially if your weather app says the wind is blowing out at Fenway.
4. One more trend on the over…
If an away team is favored, I almost always bet on the road fave and the over. Why? Because there’s a higher potential for three more ABs! In games where the road team is favored, away favorites have won 67.3% of the time this season, and extra-inning games have gone over 86% of the time.
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