We have a full, 15-game, all-day Major League Baseball slate on tap today, Saturday, August 29.
Our staff of MLB betting experts has 4 MLB Best Bets Today to pick from.
MLB Best Bets Today
The team logos in the table below represent each of the matchups that our MLB betting staff is targeting from today's slate of games. Click on the team logos for any of the matchups below to navigate to a specific bet discussed in this article.
| Game | Time (ET) | Pick |
|---|---|---|
  | 1:05 PM | |
  | 1:10 PM | |
  | 4:05 PM | |
  | 10:05 PM | |
Specific betting recommendations come from the sportsbook offering preferred odds as of writing. Always shop for the best price using our MLB Odds page, which automatically surfaces the best lines for every game. | ||
Tony Sartori's Red Sox vs Yankees Best Bet
By Tony Sartori
The Boston Red Sox hand the ball to left-hander Jake Bennett, who should serve as a good candidate to back. A second-round draft pick in 2022, Bennett has impressed in his first MLB season.
Through 15 starts, the southpaw is 8-6 with a 3.49 ERA and a 1.07 WHIP. His underlying metrics are even stronger.
Entering this matchup, Bennett owns a 3.29 xERA. He also ranks in the top third of the league in chase rate, barrel rate and hard-hit rate.
One of those 15 starts came against the New York Yankees. In that outing, Bennett surrendered just one run on three hits in more than six innings of work.
There were just five total runs scored in that game.
From the other side, the current Yankees roster owns a .143 batting average, a .143 slugging percentage and a .199 weighted on-base average in 16 combined plate appearances against Bennett.
While New York is capable of generating runs, it relies heavily on the long ball to do so. As the numbers demonstrate, that is a difficult approach against a pitcher like Bennett, who limits hard contact.
The Yankees have struggled to produce runs without the ball leaving the yard, ranking 28th in hits per game, 28th in batting average and 24th in on-base percentage. The good news for New York is that left-hander Carlos Rodón takes the mound.
Putting together another strong campaign, Rodón is 4-2 with a 3.15 ERA and a 1.21 WHIP through 11 starts. It is a smaller sample size due to injury, but he has been fantastic since returning to the rotation.
In his two starts since returning, Rodón owns a 2.25 ERA and a 1.00 WHIP.
Rodón’s underlying metrics are also strong. This season, he ranks in the top half of the league in xERA, xBA, barrel rate and hard-hit rate.
While Boston possesses a strong lineup, Rodón has proven capable of handling it. Over the past three meetings, Rodón is 1-0 with a 2.70 ERA and a 1.08 WHIP.
Pick: Under 8 (-115 or Better)
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Sean Paul's Dodgers vs Tigers Best Bet
By Sean Paul
The Dodgers paid a hefty price for Blake Snell last year, and he's made just 15 regular-season starts over two seasons. Still, when he's on the mound, very few pitchers are better.
Since returning from a three-month-long IL stint, Snell has looked phenomenal. He held the Rockies, Pirates, and Royals to three or fewer hits, gave up two total runs, and went six innings each time — nary a shred of rust for Snell despite the long layoff.
Snell is one of the game's most fearsome strikeout artists. He has a 10.5 K/9 or better in each season since 2018 and is up to 11.1 in his four outings this year. The Tigers got a taste of Tarik Skubal on Friday and now have to face another power lefty in Snell.
Offensively, the Dodgers have dealt with some tough times of late. They rank just 24th with a 91 wRC+ in August (heading into Friday). And their showing against Drew Anderson and a group of Detroit relievers didn't impress me, either.
Between Andy Pages getting hurt and the season-long slump from Mookie Betts and Kyle Tucker, it's easy to see why the Dodgers are having a rough month. Pages was a top-three hitter for this club, and Alek Thomas won't put up similar production.
If we simplify things, more than half of this Dodgers lineup is a below-average hitter. The trio of Betts, Tucker, and Teoscar Hernandez might be household names, but each has a wRC+ below 100. Plus, Thomas and both catchers (Hunter Feduccia and Ben Rortvedt) are shaky in the batter's box.
One of the more underrated players on this Tigers roster is Keider Montero. He's the polar opposite of Snell in terms of his approach. Montero is all about finesse and command, posting a 3.30 ERA with a 3.48 xERA and 3.90 FIP. The twist is Montero punches out just 5.99 batters per nine while walking just 2.02.
That could be the ideal attack against this Dodgers lineup that rarely strikes out. Montero will force Betts, Tucker, and Co. into some weak contact outs, even when Shohei Ohtani and Freddie Freeman set the table.
I wouldn't go as far as to call Montero a "Comerica Park merchant", but pitching in the stadium where home runs go to die is ideal for a pitcher with subpar raw stuff.
He gives up just 0.99 HR/9, which is much lower than you'd expect for a pitcher who sits in the 93-95 range on his fastball. Some of that can be tied to the deep outfield in Detroit that keeps the ball in the yard.
After seeing how much the Tigers struggled with Skubal, the same will likely apply against Snell. They struck out seven times against Skubal and tallied just four hits. Of late, Detroit just hasn't been a very strong offensive unit, ranking 17th in wRC+ this month.
That's before factoring in a less effective Kevin McGonigle, who has a 70 wRC+ against lefties, and no Colt Keith, who doesn't start against most southpaws. Earlier this year, Dillon Dingler was one of the scariest hitters in the league, but he has a 58 wRC+ in August with an OPS below .600.
With Dingler struggling, Riley Greene out, and McGonigle struggling against lefties, that takes away the three biggest threats in this Tigers lineup.
To me, this game screams under for a second straight game. In a pitcher's park with two very reliable arms and two offenses that have struggled a ton?
That gives the feel of a game where scoring is scarce, and that bodes well for the under.
Pick: Under 7.5 (-115 or Better)
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Matt Trollo's Marlins vs Nationals Best Bet
By Matt Trollo
True, he has gotten back to handling contact well, allowing just 5.3% Barrels/BBE with a 35.1 HardHit%, but even the 3.64 xERA that generates is a quarter run higher than actual results and still well below his contact-neutral estimators (4.37 SIERA, 4.20 xFIP).
It all rounds out to something around four. BARTOLO and I certainly agree on this.
The Washington lineup has taken some lumps with Woods on the IL, Mead gone, and Abrams running a 66 wRC+ over the last month. However, we still can’t completely ignore his 151 wRC+ against RHP this season, which keeps the projected lineup close to average.
I won’t average it out because Andres Chaparro’s 208 wRC+ vs RHP is a fluke that skews the numbers, but BARTOLO’s 94 wRC+ projection is a fine stand-in.
The Marlins also have a solid defense with Saturday’s projected starters at 12 FRV.
The bullpen is closer to the bottom of the league though, both by BARTOLO’s season ranks (21sT) and last 30-day estimators.
All of that gets us pretty close to four runs on Saturday without even considering the environment, and that environment (park, weather and umpire) leans very hitter-friendly.
In the first game, I mentioned Washington as one of the highest run environments in the league (+6%). Again here, BARTOLO is the low man on the weather (+2.8%), with scheduled umpire Emil Jiemenz (+0.1%) also neutral.
This looks very much like the run environment in Minnesota. At least an 8-9% bump. That would push Washington well above their 3.5-run team total.
Pick: Nationals TT Over 3.5 (-135 or Better)
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Tanner McGrath's Orioles vs Athletics Best Bet
Our own Sean Zerillo projects some value on the Athletics in this game.
If you’d like to dive deeper into this matchup, I recommend checking out BARTOLO, our new PRO baseball betting tool that gives our PRO subscribers access to all the live data we use to project MLB games each day.
Here’s a sneak peek at what BARTOLO provides for this game:
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Pick: A's ML (+120 or Better)
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