Top MLB Futures Betting Pick: Best Bet to Win AL East (2022)
Will the MLB season start on time? Right now, it's questionable at best, but that hasn't stopped the sportsbooks from releasing future lines. From award winners to division winners, all the way down to the World Series winner, there are plenty of available wagers and some value to be had.
This is the first installment of a four-part series detailing my favorite MLB future bets for the 2022 season. Part one is a division winner wager, and we're diving into the toughest division in baseball – the AL East.
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AL East Division Winner – Tampa Bay Rays (+325)
We've already seen some sharp action on the Rays as they opened anywhere from +330 to +350 and are now down to +325 at some books and +300 at others. Is it hard to win your division three years in a row? It sure is, especially if you play in the AL East, where there are four legitimate World Series contenders. But the Rays have proven their versatility is built to win in the regular season. So let's dive into some of the numbers.
As mentioned, Tampa Bay has won this division two years in a row, and it's not like the AL East magically became strong overnight. In 2020, the Yankees and Blue Jays both made the playoffs, but the Rays still won the division by seven games. In 2021, the Yankees and Red Sox both made the playoffs with 92 wins, and the Blue Jays notched 91 wins themselves, yet the Rays still won the division by eight games. In the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, Tampa Bay had the best divisional record of any American League team and tied the Dodgers for the most wins within their division with 27. And last year, the Rays were one of three teams to win 50-plus games in their division. But, of course, the best way to win your division is to beat the teams within it, and the Rays are built to do just that.
Tampa Bay also has two significant factors in the regular season – pitching and depth. Let's start with the arms. They lost Tyler Glasnow, their flamethrowing ace, to Tommy John’s surgery for the year, and that's a significant loss. But they'll get year two of Shane McClanahan, a flamethrower in his own right from the left side who struck out 10.3 batters per nine in his rookie year. The Rays will also get a full year of top prospect Shane Baz who pitched to a sparkling 2.03 ERA in his three starts at the big league level while averaging 97 MPH on his four-seam fastball. Expected batting average against Baz was .167, miles below the league average of .242, and he struck out 36.7% of the hitters he faced. He's good, and so is McClanahan, and their pitching styles play perfectly in a division filled with teams who love the all-or-nothing approach.
The Rays bullpen is also a force to be reckoned with. According to ZiPS projections on Fangraphs, only the Yankees have a better-projected bullpen in terms of zWAR, but that doesn't necessarily mean the Rays bullpen doesn't have the potential to be even better than New York's. Tampa uses their arms in a multitude of ways – openers, long relievers, closer by committee – so it's not as easy to project the ceiling as it is to project the floor. What is easy to project is the fact that they, according to their manager Kevin Cash – have a stable of guys who throw 97. With the way today's game is played, one swing can change the outcome of a game, and the more bullpen arms a team has to prevent that from happening, the more games they'll win.
And finally – depth. The Rays have become known for playing nearly everyone on their roster all over the diamond, batting them up and down the lineup, and giving 12-plus hitters roughly equal numbers of at-bats over the course of the year. They're built to withstand slumps, injuries, pitching matchups, and weather because they can tinker with their lineup and still be effective. According to ZiPS, the Rays have 16 players in their organization with a zWAR projection of 0.9 or better. For context, the Yankees have 12, the Red Sox have 10, and the Blue Jays have 9. The Rays can withstand an extensive injury a lot easier than their division rivals – even a loss like Nelson Cruz in the offseason – and that's a big reason why they're primed to win the East for a third straight year.
I'm having trouble understanding why the Rays have the third-best odds to win the division, but we'll gladly take advantage of that. Despite sharp money knocking Tampa's value down a bit, I would play them all the way down to +275 to win the American League East.
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