Paul Skenes Headlines Friday June 26th's Best MLB Bets

We’ve made it to the halfway point of the season! Enjoy it while you can since it sure looks like we’re headed for an extended lockout next year.

For now I’ve got a couple MLB Picks from the same game today.

Season Record 39-38-1, -1.65 Units

Reds at Pirates

Under 7.5 (100 Kalshi)

Paul Skenes Over 7.5 Strikeouts (-153 DraftKings)

We’ve got Paul Skenes vs. the Cincinnati Reds and it looks like a bit of a mismatch. Cincy is slashing just .226/.309/.389 on the year for a 90 wRC+ that is the 2nd worst in MLB. They’ve been particularly anemic lately as that’s down to .198/.287/.352 and a 74 wRC+ over the last two weeks. Meanwhile, Skenes is suffering through the worst of his three MLB seasons.

Yes, his ERA has ballooned…… all the way up to 2.86. Rest assured, he’s still an absolute ace, he just does not look likely to defend his Cy in a world where Jacob Misiorowski is unhittable. But Skenes is pretty much exactly the same pitcher as always. His 30.6% K% and 5.1% BB% are right at his career levels and his 2.86 SIERA is actually down a quarter run from last year. He’s even rolling a bit as he hasn’t allowed more than two earned runs in any of his last five starts over which he has 42 K’s in 28 innings.

So why not just take the Pirates to win? Well first of all the price is kind of high at -194 and secondly the matchup doesn’t set up particularly well for their bats. Andrew Abbott starts for the Reds, and he’s on a roll of his own after a rough start to the season. He has a 2.41 ERA over his last 10 starts. As is usually the case with him, Abbot is way outperforming his peripherals as he has just an 8.2% K-BB%. It’s a bit of a Houdini act that he’s pulled off his whole career as he has a 3.49 ERA vs. a 4.52 SIERA.

How does he do it?

Well he gives up a lot of fly balls as he has a 20 degree launch angle, but not an enormous quantity of homers even though he calls Great American (Sm)allpark his home. PNC is much more of a pitchers park, so that should play into his hands tonight. Plus the Pirates don’t hit lefties well as they have an 87 wRC+ against them on the season. I just don’t expect to see many runs overall tonight, so I’ll go with the under here.

As to the Skenes K prop, well he’s on a roll with the Whiffs and the Reds are a bit of an easy mark. They have a 24.8% K%vs. righties, second worst in MLB. They’re really flailing lately with a 27.3% K% over the last two weeks.