Editor’s Note: Over a sample size of 449 completed bets (this doesn’t include outstanding futures picks), Joe’s picks published here and back at All Things NIT, our former site, have an average return on investment of 6% when weighted by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high). This, compared to other picks consistently published online, is pretty good. It would be a decent annual ROI for an investor. But instead it’s coming, on average, on each of these picks.
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Three picks today.
As always:
- Lines come from the Vegas Consensus at the time this is written, or the best approximation I can find of it online.
- Data from FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, Baseball Savant, Spotrac, and ESPN is often used and/or cited.
- The blurbs often aren’t justifications of the picks. Often, they’re instead just notes about something or someone related to the pick. Something that interests me. You are not required to read these. I don’t explain the picks because in general, the rationale behind each pick is the same, so it would be boring to say over and over again that the numbers I use project a good return on investment and I see no red flags significant enough to make me hold off.
Washington @ Pittsburgh
In addition to hitting two home runs yesterday, Juan Soto passed his plate appearance total from last season’s spectacular entry into the MLB ranks. Here’s how the two years compare:
2018: 494 PA’s, 22 HR’s, .292/.406/.517, 146 wRC+, 3.7 fWAR
2019: 495 PA’s, 28 HR’s, .286/.398/.553, 141 wRC+, 3.5 fWAR
The latter is, of course, marginally worse, but only marginally, and both are eye-popping given his age. Soto won’t turn 21 until late October, yet his career wRC+ is better than that of A-Rod, and he’s produced more fWAR in an effective season-and-a-half than a perfectly healthy Eric Hosmer has since the end of 2015.
On a team with Anthony Rendon and Max Scherzer, in a division with Ronald Acuña Jr., and in a league with Christian Yelich and Cody Bellinger, it’s easy for Soto to be overshadowed. But he’s shaping up to be a great player, which a very real shot at 40 home runs in his 20-year-old season—something I believe only Mel Ott has done, 90 years ago.
Pick: Over 10 (-110). Low confidence.
Milwaukee @ St. Louis
Speaking of Christian Yelich, he continues his MVP race with Cody Bellinger.
And what a race it is.
Here’s the tale of the tape so far:
Yelich: 110 games, 491 PA’s, 41 HR’s, .335/.424/.698, 176 wRC+, 6.5 fWAR
Bellinger: 121 games, 518 PA’s, 42 HR’s, .317/.415/.671, 172 wRC+, 6.8 fWAR
It’s worth noting that bWAR has Bellinger at 8.1 and Yelich at only 5.9, which, along with the Dodgers’ playoff certainty and the Brewers’ one-in-four shot at October, cements that Bellinger is the clear favorite.
But it might not be by much.
Pick: Milwaukee to win (+107). Low confidence.
Colorado @ Arizona
The Rockies are seventh in baseball in runs scored. Which is fine, but given Coors Field’s 1.4-ish park factor, isn’t very good. They’re 26th in wRC+, making the point more effectively. The Rockies offense is not very good.
This isn’t all that unusual. The Rockies haven’t ranked outside the MLB’s bottom five in wRC+ since 2016, and they haven’t ranked outside the bottom ten since 2014. The fact they appeared in the wild card game each of the last two years is a testament to a pitching staff that ranked seventh in fWAR in both seasons.
The solution to the Rockies’ offensive woes might actually be simple. They’ve given 300 or more plate appearances to four players whose fWAR grades out below replacement-level: Tony Wolters, Daniel Murphy, Ian Desmond, and Raimel Tapia. And while defense factors into that negative fWAR for three of the four (all except Wolters), the average wRC+ of the hitters is 80. The definition of replacement-level is general enough that one can’t be sure the Rockies have a replacement-level hitter waiting in the wings. But it’s certainly possible they do, and seeing as they’re in last in the NL West, ahead of only the Marlins and Pirates in the National League, now is a good time to find out.
Pick: Under 9.5 (-105). Low confidence.
