Today’s Best Bets: The Astros Are Worse Than They Look

Sundays are hard. Glad that’s over.


AL West

Markets are still taking the Astros pretty seriously. That’s questionable. Even just looking at the roster on paper, it’s a .500 roster, and that’s if all their injured pitchers come back on the early side of realistic estimates.

Pick: Seattle to win +115. 2.00 units to win 2.30.

NLCS

The Diamondbacks, on the other hand, got through a road trip to Philadelphia and Queens at 4–2. That should move the needle at least a little bit. It hasn’t yet.

Pick: Arizona to win +4000. 2.00 units to win 80.00.


Miami at Atlanta

Eury Pérez struck out a lot of Rockies in his season debut, but his two outings since then have gone poorly. Grant Holmes isn’t going to win the Cy Young, but we’ll take him at this price, especially with Atlanta playing better than even the Dodgers so far this year going by run differential and BaseRuns.

Pick: Atlanta to win –146. 14.53 units to win 9.95.

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These numbers are for the 2025–26 effort, which is currently scheduled to end at the end of the NBA Finals or Stanley Cup Final (whichever comes second). Sorry for the poor transparency. We’ll do a better job tracking the 2026–27 campaign, which is already underway with our MLB futures portfolio.

2025–26: –664.25 units (started with 1,000-unit bankroll)

2025–26: –7% average ROI (weighted by unit; sample size: 1,119 single-game markets plus seven completed futures portfolios)

Pre-2025: 0% average ROI (worse when limited to only sports)

Units taken from best odds we can find at major sportsbooks available to most Americans.

These bets are not investment advice. If you’re worried you or someone you know might have a gambling addiction, call 1-800-GAMBLER for free, confidential help.

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The Barking Crow's resident numbers man. NIT Bracketology, college football forecasting, and things of that nature. Fields inquiries on Twitter: @joestunardi.
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