MLB Betting Trends: Building a Plus-Money Parlay for White Sox-Royals Game

Taking the over is a good start, but let’s get creative and find more value.

Author:
Jennifer Piacenti
Publish date:
May 8, 2023

In this story:

What a weekend of baseball! Paul Goldschmidt had three home runs in a game for the third time in his career, the Rays rallied to walk it off in the 10th vs. the Yankees on Sunday, and the Mariners took two out of three vs. the Astros.

We took a plus-money bet on Friday for the A’s and Royals to go over the run total, and it worked out well for us. Let’s continue with that theme today.

The Royals bullpen has an ERA of 5.40, the fourth-highest mark in the league. Royals games have gone over the run total 51.5% of the time this year (17-16-2), despite the fact they are averaging a mere 3.89 runs per game, which ranks 26th in the league. Yes, that’s how bad the Royals bullpen is.

But wait, there’s more! The Royals face the White Sox Monday, and Chicago’s bullpen is even worse. White Sox relievers have an ERA of 6.15 on the season. White Sox games have gone over 59.4% of the time (19-13-3) and their offense is scoring 4.43 runs per game this season.

Dylan Cease gets the start for the Sox today, and despite finishing second in AL Cy Young voting last year, Cease is struggling this season with an ERA of 4.58 and a hard-hit rate in the bottom 4% of the league. However, he’s still getting plenty of whiffs with his fastball, so I’m definitely jumping on his K prop of over 5.5. The Royals strikeout 23.5% of the time and Cease strikes out batters at a rate of 10.95 per nine innings. If he lasts five innings, he easily gets there.

On the other side of this one is Zack Greinke. Greinke isn’t fooling anyone anymore and he doesn't even get swings and misses. The best thing about Greinke is that, in complete contrast to Cease, he doesn’t issue many free passes. Other than that, with an ERA of 5.25 and an xERA of 5.55, this White Sox team should be able to get their knocks in even without Eloy Jimenez and Jake Burger in the lineup.

The simple bet here is the over, but I was able to create a parlay on SI Sportsbook for plus money. Consider getting creative to lock in more value.