Editor’s Note: Joe Stunardi is our resident guy-who-knows-numbers. He’d downplay how good this is, but over a sample size of 241 completed bets (this doesn’t include outstanding futures picks), his picks published here and back at All Things NIT have a positive average return on investment when weighted by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high), meaning following him blindly to this point would have resulted in winning more than one lost.
As always, use these picks at your own risk. Only you are responsible for any money you lose following Joe’s picks. At the same time, though, you’re also responsible for any money you win.
Similarly, if you have a gambling problem, or even think you might have a gambling problem, get help. If you need help getting help, reach out to us at allthingsnit@gmail.com.
One pick for today’s games.
As always:
- Lines come from the Vegas Consensus at the time this is written.
- FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, Baseball Savant, and Spotrac are all great.
- The writeups for each pick aren’t justifications. The justification for each is that the numbers I’m using indicate its expected payout is positive by more than a standard deviation or two, and I’m not coming across enough red flags to pass on it. The writeups are just words about the teams playing the games.
Pittsburgh @ San Diego
After an offseason in which they showed they were willing to spend big, the Padres are hanging in there in the NL West, sitting one game under .500 entering play tonight. Neither FanGraphs nor FiveThirtyEight views them as a major player in the wild card race (playoff odds of 17% and 10%, respectively), but one thing those projections don’t consider is how likely a particular team is to “go for it,” buying at the trade deadline.
The Padres’ farm system is stacked, which many would suggest means they’ll be patient, especially with Manny Machado—one of the game’s best players—locked up through at least 2023. And while that would probably be sensible, especially given that the division title should be out of reach no matter what moves the Padres make, it’s theoretically possible they could turn those long-term, uncertain assets into short-term, more predictable ones.
As it stands, though, Padres fans’ best hope for 2019 is probably improvement from within, whether through exciting debuts or the players already in the MLB achieving better results. In the latter camp, I’m talking specifically about Ian Kinsler, who’s been woeful at the plate with a 53 wRC+, but has been hampered by a .177 BABIP that’s bound to improve. Kinsler no longer has the ability to be the 5.4-WAR player he was for the Tigers in 2016, but it’s reasonable to expect him to be above-replacement level. With their window just beginning to crack open, and slim playoff chances this year, letting Luis Urias incubate a bit longer isn’t a bad idea.
Pick: Pittsburgh to win +133. Low confidence.
