Torpedo bats are all the rage in Major League Baseball these days, so much so that FanDuel offered a separate category of props called “Yankees Torpedo Bats” where five of their players (Paul Goldschmidt, Cody Bellinger, Jazz Chisholm, Austin Wells, and Anthony Volpe” all were given their own category and odds with which to hit a home run. Perhaps those odds are better than we think, especially since New York set an MLB record for most home runs (18) through a team’s first four games, surpassing Detroit’s previous record of 16 in 2006.
With only five games on Thursday’s MLB slate, we are narrowing down our MLB player prop bets to our top two selections.
Read on for our top MLB player prop bets for Thursday, April 3rd.
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Thursday's Best MLB Player Prop Bets
(MLB player prop bet odds courtesy of DraftKings Sportsbook)
Rafael Devers Under 0.5 hits (+120)
Rafael Devers entered Wednesday as one of the coldest hitters in all of Major League Baseball, starting 0-for-19 with 15 strikeouts. He did get off the snide with hits in his final two at-bats yesterday, but I am not ready to call his slump over just yet.
He faces a starting pitcher in Charlie Morton that he is familiar with, slashing .235/.278/.294 against him in 34 at-bats. Just two of Devers’ eight hits against Morton have gone for extra bases, and his 23.5% strikeout rate against him suggests he should finish with another couple of K’s, especially given the way he is going of late.
Devers is too good of a hitter to let this slump go on for much longer, but we are jumping on while it lasts, as these are decent odds for him to once again go hitless.
Taijuan Walker Under 4.5 strikeouts (-120)
Taijuan Walker makes his season debut against a Colorado Rockies team that once again projects to be one of the worst teams in baseball, especially on the road. However, while the matchup cannot get any juicier, Walker cannot be trusted under any circumstances, especially with how he performed last year and how his spring went.
Walker pitched just 83 2/3 innings last year, but finished with a 7.10 ERA and career worsts in WHIP (1.721) and K/9 (6.2).
The righty typically is a much better pitcher in the first half of the season than the second half, sporting a .600 career winning percentage and 3.75 ERA in the first half compared to a .434 winning percentage and 4.95 ERA in the second half.
But how he performed in spring training leaves much to be desired, pitching to a 7.41 ERA and a 4.2 K/9 rate in 17 innings. The Rockies are one of the worst contact lineups in the majors, but I expect Walker to still be kicking the rust off in this start.
Mike Spector is a featured writer at BettingPros. For more from Mike, check out his archive and follow him @MikeSpector01.
