Tuesday's MLB slate includes 15 games and plenty of enticing matchups, including juicy underdogs across the board.
As a reminder, the Payoff Pitch podcast MLB experts break down their favorite picks from the day's slate every Monday, Tuesday and Friday, including each analyst's favorite underdog on the slate, and they're aligned on one underdog pick today.
You can read about their picks below, and be sure to subscribe to Payoff Pitch for MLB picks and predictions all season long.
Rays vs. Mets, 7:10 p.m.
Jalen Beeks vs. Justin Verlander
Sean Zerillo: I made Tampa +130 in this matchup. They’re also in a really good spot because they had an off day yesterday, they played a weekend series in New York, so they didn’t have to travel.
The Mets had to travel. The Mets have played two full games since the Rays last played, so the Rays’ bullpen is fully rested. Jalen Beeks is starting and Yonny Chirinos would be the piggyback guy behind him, but the Rays have a fully rested bullpen. They can manage this game however they want to. The Mets bullpen is much more banged up – they need longevity. Even if Justin Verlander's a little shaky, they’re going to make him go six or seven innings – they need the innings, especially with the rest of their rotation being a complete mystery at this point.
From a splits perspective, the Rays are the No. 1 team against right-handed pitching. There’s a lot of reasons to like them in this matchup, but just in terms of the pure spot, you rarely see a road team better rested and with less travel than the home team, but that’s the case here.
The Mets have literally played two full games since the Rays last played. So Rays at +130 I like. They also get Pete Fairbanks back off the IL today as well. The bullpen is getting better with that–a lot of reasons to like the Rays.
Anthony Dabbundo: Chirinos looks good to me. The Stuff+ is above 100. I know he had struggled with command in the minors and was really inconsistent there, but he did start to figure it out toward the end. At one point in the minors his ERA was over 6, certainly not encouraging stuff, but improved as time went on and got closer to that big league start.
The strikeouts weren’t really there – they haven’t been there thus far, he’s striking out 9.5% of batters – but if you look at the stuff, I’d expect that to increase going forward. And he’s been generating a lot of grounders, which is the Chirinos way, and now he’s been successful with that sinker, which is his best pitch.
I don’t really love Verlander still. The stuff was good on the first start, so that’s encouraging for him, but either way, he faced two pretty bad lineups – the Reds and the Tigers. He gave up a couple solo homers, and had a rough start but then settled in, but this Rays lineup is a different beast. I know it does suck that it’s looking like Yandy Diaz is going to be out. He's getting an MRI. He’s probably their most underrated hitter – not so underrated anymore because he’s got a dozen homers – but his on-base skills are huge for this lineup.
Either way, even without him, they have the depth.
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