We kick-off the 6th full week of the MLB season on Monday with a 10-game slate that includes a few intriguing matchups. After diving into each of the games, there are several opportunities to make money with some MLB best bets in these series opening contests.
MLB Best Bets for Monday, May 6th
Best Bet #1) Detroit Tigers First 5 Innings Moneyline (-105)
The Detroit Tigers open up their three-game series against their AL Central rivals in the Cleveland Guardians on Monday in the midst of a decent stretch, despite their latest series. They were in the Bronx over the weekend taking on the New York Yankees, where they wound up being swept despite in three fairly competitive games. However, Detroit has still been playing better overall, going 8-7 in the second half of April prior to last weekend behind a solid offense that ranked 11th in batting average and seventh in slugging during that span.
On Monday night, they get to send out Jack Flaherty to the mound, who has been stellar this year. Flaherty owns the best SIERA among 134 starting pitchers with 20+ innings this year, dominating hitters from all aspects, posting great results such as an excellent strikeout rate, a good ground ball percentage, and a solid hard-hit allowed rate. The same can’t be said for his Cleveland counterpart on Monday, who will be Triston McKenzie. McKenzie’s 5.37 SIERA ranks 129th due not only to his low strikeout and hard-hit allowed rates, both of which rank in the bottom 32% of the league, but his command issues have given him the fifth-worst walk rate among starting pitchers.
While the Cleveland offense has been solid this year overall, they have fallen off recently, where their .211 average and .351 slugging both rank in the bottom half of the MLB. With the massive starting pitching edge identified and some recent stats showing these two offenses are more equal than they appear, the Tigers should be able to carry a lead into the second half of the series opener on Monday.
Best Bet #2) Cole Ragans over 16.5 outs recorded (-120)
When the Kansas City Royals host the Milwaukee Brewers in their early week matchup, they will send out Cole Ragans to the mound for the series opener. Ragans has been electric in 2024, ranking in the top 25 in numerous key metrics, including SIERA, Stuff+, and strikeout-rate. This should bode incredibly well for him on Monday night, as not only has he been great overall, but he gets a stellar matchup against the Brewers. Milwaukee’s offense produced at top-10 rate in most statistics early in the year, but they have fallen off recently, coming in at 17th and 14th in batting average (.227) and slugging percentage (.390) over their last three series. Where they have struggled even more this season has been against southpaws, which Ragan happens to be. When facing left-handed pitching, the Brewers’ average and slugging drop down to an abysmal .198 and .326, both ranking 27th in the league and having the eighth-highest strikeout rate.
With the massive edge Ragans has today over the Milwaukee offense, the first look was at betting the Royals, but ultimately passed. The Royals offense has been far too mediocre this year to back and they still haven’t generated any power, ranking 18th in slugging over their last three series. Instead, the best bet jumped out at Ragans to record over 16.5 outs, meaning he at least needs to get two outs in the 5th inning. This is something Ragans has done in four of his seven starts, despite all seven coming against top-13 teams or better in wRC+ against southpaws, while Milwaukee ranks just 23rd.
Best Bet #3) Oakland A’s Team Total over 3.5 runs scored (+105)
The Oakland A’s continue to be the most surprising team in baseball, now sitting just one game under .500 after a series win over the weekend. It was highlighted on Friday night when we cashed our A’s moneyline bet that they had a stellar bullpen, but now the bats seem to be coming around too. Oakland ranks 12th in wRC+ in just over their last three series when filtering out their outlier game where they scored 20 runs on Saturday, and rank fourth when including it. This success can be heavily attributed to their success against southpaws, where Oakland ranks 9th in slugging and see their strikeout rate drop a couple points. They will get the chance to capitalize this on Monday night when they kick-off their series against the Texas Rangers, who send out LHP Andrew Heaney for the start. Heany has had a couple better starts as of late but as struggled over the entirety of 2024, ranking 85th of 134 starters with 20+ innings in SIERA and posting the 119th ranked Stuff+.
With the A’s success against left-handed pitching this year and getting to face a middling southpaw in Heany on Monday night, they should be able to score runs on Monday night. When also factoring in they can score against a Rangers’ bullpen that ranks just 14th in Stuff+ and 17th in SIERA over their last few series, Oakland’s team total over 3.5 runs scored brings itself forth as a best bet.
Main Image: Vincent Carchietta-USA TODAY Sports
