Three Pitcher Prop Bets for Friday, June 22

It’s time to take a look at three possible pitcher strikeout props for the day and how to take advantage of some in-season biases around pitcher performance. Here we get a chance to look at three pitchers not typically on the DFS radar, but who are coming in with advantageous odds. All props are courtesy of Bodog.

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Pitcher

Patrick Corbin
Opponent - PIT (Ivan Nova) Park - PIT
Over 6 K's -115  Projected: 6.98 K's
I wrote about Corbin in our daily MLB picks article but it's time to double-down on the case for Corbin here. He's spiked his K% this season, going from 22% career number to 31% this season. It's quite the jump and I'm always a little wary of these kinds of gains this far into a career. But as I outlined in that article, there's some explanation when you consider he's now throwing curveball 11% of the time, while really reducing the use of his fastball (down to 19%). It makes sense consider (per Fangraphs), the fastball has been a negative pitch for his career. His career Pitch Value on the FB is -31 while the slider, sinker and now curveball have all been average or much better. Leaving your worst pitch off the repertoire and moving to s@#$ that actually works has meant the K's followed suit. The Pirates aren't a swing-happy bunch with their projected lineup striking out about 4% less than league average against lefties. And yet I still don't think Vegas has fully caught up to Corbin's new strikeout stuff.

Sean Newcomb
Opponent - BAL (Alex Cobb) Park - BAL
Over 6 K's -120 Projected 7.17 K's
Newcomb was another guy I wrote about in the main article and it's somewhat rare for the same value guys on FanDuel and DraftKings to ring in as strikeout prop guys as well, but there's value on his K stuff in this matchup. There's a lot working in his favor. The Orioles already strikeout around 22% of the time against lefties this season and their current lineup (released this afternoon) strikes out about 5% more than league average against lefties. It helps they are moving to a National League park and Newcomb gets the pitcher's spot at least once, maybe twice. Plus Chris Davis is almost good for two K's just on his own (39% of the time against lefties this season). Newcomb's big issue in reaching the over is his ability to stay in games because he struggles with control and runs pitch counts up with walks. Not as big an issue against the Orioles who hate the practice of taking free passes. If anything, I'm more bullish on the over for Newcomb than Corbin though you need some extra juice on the over.

Jon Gray
Opponent - MIA (Wei-Yin Chen) Park - MIA
Under 6 K's +110 Projected 5.47 K's
Look, I'm typically on Team Gray and think there's an excellent major league pitcher hidden behind the 5.89 ERA. He's run horrible in both BABIP and LOB% this season and it's casued some heartache even though the peripherals have been stellar. And yet, I think we can take the under against the Marlins. First off, he's going in Coors which can make even the lightest hitting team look like sluggers. The Marlins' projected lineup strikes out around 3% more than league average against righties this season and I like that we are getting the plus side of the bet and can push if need be. Gray has been better at home, but I think Vegas is projecting the Marlins to be a little more K happy than is the reality.

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