Baseball season has arrived. The spring training position battles and injuries have gotten under way. I will be previewing all six divisions from a betting perspective and will give out all the futures plays for free. Traditionally baseball is my best sport to handicap, but we did have a losing season in 2022. All time tracked record in MLB still shows a 1.8% ROI and we’ll be getting back to our winning ways in 2023. You’ll be able to find my MLB betting package available here at TheOddsbreakers.com shortly. It is $400 for every MLB game all the way through the playoffs.
I’ll finish up the season preview with a brief article about how I see the playoffs going and where there is value in pennant and World Series odds. We’ll throw in some season long props as well and MVP, CY and ROY predictions.
AL East
Betting Odds to Win Division and Season Over/Under Win Totals
New York Yankess +110/94.5
Toronto Blue Jays +200/91.5
Tampa Bay Rays +365/89
Baltimore Orioles +1000/77.5
Boston Red Sox +1000/78.5
Toronto Blue Jays
Yup. It’s not the Yankees I have at the top of this division. The Jays were very active this off-season. To start they traded away established cleanup man Teoscar Hernandez to Seattle who knocked them out in 2022 for a prospect and a solid reliever in Erik Swanson. This looked like a bad move initially however they were just getting started. The big splash came next with the Jays trading Gabriel Moreno one of their three top tier catchers along with Lourdes Gurrel for Daulton Varsho. Varsho is a big time left handed bat that the Jays really needed. They also got busy with free agents. First, they signed Kevin Kiermaier to patrol Center Field which is more a defensive play than anything. Followed that up by snagging the Bassitt Hound (Chris Bassitt) to improve the rotation, and finally added Brandon Belt to put another solid left handed bat in the lineup. The top seven in the lineup all have major pop in their bats. George Springer, Bo Bichette, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. will start things off followed by some combination of Brandon Belt, Alejandro Kirk, Daulton Varsho and Matt Chapman. They then have speed and defense at the bottom to flip the lineup over in Kiermaier and Whit Merrifield. The pitching staff is led by Alex Manoah and Kevin Gausman. Bassitt will slot in third and they are hoping Jose Berrios and Yusei Kukuchi can improve upon 2022. The solid bullpen is led by Jordan Romano closing things out, but is really good top to bottom. Their young core is all here now and the Blue Jays are going all in this year. Don’t be surprised if they add a starter and another elite bullpen arm along the way if things are looking good in July. Prediction 92-70
New York Yankees
On February 1st it looked like The Yankees looked like they had put together the top pitching staff in the big leagues featuring Gerrit Cole, Nestor Cortes, Luis Severino, Frankie Montas and the recently signed Carlos Rodon. Since then Montas is out for the year with shoulder surgery. Rodon has hit the IL with a strained forearm, and although no structural elbow issues so far usually a strained forearm is the precursor to a UCL problem. Severino then hit they IL with a strained Lat this week. That leaves the Yanks strarting the year with Cole, Cortes and three guys who weren’t in their rotation plans to start the year, although Clarke Schmidt is a former first round pick. Clay Holmes and Jonathan Loaisiga anchor the Bullpen, which while young proved effective last year in picking up the pieces of Aroldis Chapman. The lineup is their strength with Aaron Judge leading them. Much of the core of this lineup is older and they are hoping for a youth movement to help reinvigorate it. Anthony Volpe has seemingly won the job at shortstop and will hope to provide just that. They will need healthy years from the elder statesmen like Anthony Rizzo, DJ Lemahieu, Josh Donaldson and Giancarlo Stanton to have a chance to repeat the 99 wins from a year ago. Prediction 90-72
Tampa Bay Rays
The Rays always seem to be able to rebuild through trades and homegrown talent, but I think they are starting to run a little thin on both this year especially with starting pitcher injuries. I’ll start with those, Shane Baz is already out for the season, and always injured Tyler Glasnow is going to miss at least two months. Shane McLanahan proved himself to be an ace last season, and Jeffrey Springs rediscovered himself at 30. Drew Rasmussen is solid, but the Rays weren’t counting on big impacts from Zach Eflin and Josh Fleming. The bullpen is top 5 in the majors, and the Rays will mix guys in and out of the closer roll. Pete Fairbanks and Jason Adam will get most of the chances. The Rays are hoping can’t miss prospect Wander Franco finally has his healthy breakout season. He is only 22 years old, so I am not worried, and I think it will be now. If he does they can compete, but if not Randy Arozarena is the only other top tier talent in an underwhelming lineup. Prediction 84-78
Baltimore Orioles
I think the O’s are one more year away from really competing and they really overachieved last season. One metric I saw had them 20 wins above performance expectation. That being said I really love the young core of bats on this team. Cedric Mullins, Austin Hays, Anthony Santander and Ryan Mountcastle each have shown solid growth in their 2-4 years in MLB. They were joined last year by switch hitting Adley Rutschman at catcher who will soon be the #1 catcher in the league I believe. Following him to The Show was Gunnar Henderson who while not as polished has an extremely high ceiling. The pitching staff added Kyle Gibson and Cole Irvin who will eat some innings over the course of the year, but also likely give up their fair share of runs. Dean Kremer and Kyle Bradish are kind of in the same mold. Grayson Rodriguez is a first round draft pick that should break the year with the club, and very quickly could become their top option. Felix Bautista is a top 5 closer i the bullpen, but he doesn’t have much help. If they get a top tier arm in free agency next off season this team could be ready to go after a division title. Prediction 78-84
Boston Red Sox
The Red Sox still have Rafael Devers, but lost Xander Bogaerts to free agency. The signed Justin Turner and Adam Duvall to replace him as well as snagging international free agent Masataka Yoshida. Most of the lineup doesn’t have any speed, and the bottom half of it is well below average. The pitching staff gets a healthy Chris Sale back, but free agent signing Corey Kluber is three years past his prime. They will get James Paxton back at some point, but he hasn’t pitched much since Covid. Tanner Houck and Kutter Crawford will fill in until Paxton and Brayan Bello get back. Kenley Jansen takes over as closer and Chris Martin comes in as setup guy. I don’t see any improvement from Boston. Prediction 77-85
AL East Free Plays
I just think the Yankees have gotten older, and the pitching staff injuries are going to catch-up with them. They’re going to have to outscore everyone to win. Toronto just has a better lineup top to bottom and a lot more youth on their side.
Toronto Blue Jays to Win Division +200 1.5 Units
New York Yankees under 94.5 Wins 1 Unit
Tampa Bay Rays Under 89 Wins 1.5 Units
