We've had some struggling aces this season — Chris Sale, Max Scherzer, Corey Kluber, Aaron Nola and Blake Snell just to name a few. We're more than a month into the year and some of these fellas have ERAs north of 5.
Personally, I couldn't care less about their ERAs. All I care about is the Ks. Mr. Snell takes the mound tonight against a surprisingly good Diamondbacks team and will look to put two ugly starts against the Royals behind him.
MLB Player Props: Monday, May 6
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Rays SP Blake Snell
The 2018 American League Cy Young winner has been very hit or miss, and he's coming off two straight big time misses against the Royals.
Here are his combined numbers from those consecutive starts:
- 6.1 innings, 9 earned runs, 11 hits, 5 strikeouts, 5 walks, 2 home runs
It's especially bizarre considering his three previous starts looked like this:
- 19 innings, 1 earned run, 9 hits, 33 strikeouts, 2 walks, 1 home run
With his recent woes, the strikeout prop market is down on the southpaw. You know what they say, though: Buy low, sell high.
Other than his first start of the season against the Astros, Snell's strikeout over/unders have been between 7.5 and 8.5. Today, that's at 6.5 and doesn't even have very excessive juice.
Snell will face a Diamondbacks team that doesn't know him very well, which has been a spot that Snell has excelled in.
Per our FantasyLabs Trends Tool, Snell has a Plus/Minus of +10.78 against National League teams in his career compared to +1.85 against the American League.
This is something that I've noticed for many pitchers, especially with studs. Elite stuff from a pitcher can really trouble a lineup that hasn't seen him yet. That was certainly the case when he struck out 13 Rockies a month ago.
While Snell's ERA has gone up to a troublesome 4.31, he still has some exceptional advanced statistics.
Of 155 pitchers with 20-plus innings pitched, his swinging strike rate of 17.9% ranks 1st in the league. His contact rate of 60.9%? First in the league by a wide margin ahead of Luis Castillo's 65.2%. This man can get the bats whiffing.
You probably won't find a strikeout over/under lower than this for a long time for Snellzilla. We're projecting 7.4 Ks for the ace. Buy low, baby.
The Pick: Over 6.5 (-120)
