Dan Johnson shares his top player prop bets for today’s MLB slate, including home run, HRRs, and more.
Today prop card is built around hitters who can stay attached to the whole inning, because 3+ HRR is where pretty Savant pages can turn cruel fast. A walk can strand. A single can rot at first. A premium lineup spot can look perfect at 6:40 and feel cursed by the third inning. So the card is looking for scoring-event gravity: top-four roles, traffic in front, real thump, enough lineup behind them to cash in free bases, and prices that still respect how weird this market can get. Sal Stewart gives us the Reds cleanup lane after he was the one piece that actually came through in that Philly mess. Brent Rooker brings the Oakland cleanup damage at a better number than the shorter bats around him. Jonathan Aranda is the dome value that looks too long at +175. Mike Trout is still Mike Trout at a fair +145. Ben Rice adds the Yankees heater, with a Savant page that looks like it should come with a warning label.
Here’s how I’ll play it. I’ll be pumping out props and predictions for individual games all season, with plenty of coverage here on DraftKings Network. Follow my handle @dansby_edits for more betting plays.
Rice is a clean bet at +155 because the number is still giving enough room on a hitter whose current Statcast page looks completely obnoxious. He is projected second for the Yankees, with Aaron Judge and Cody Bellinger directly behind him, so the HRR math is sturdy: plate appearances, run lane, one-swing damage, and premium bats behind him to turn walks and singles into runs. The weather and pitcher add some grit to the handicap—Yankee Stadium has rain in the forecast, and Trey Yesavage enters with a 1.40 ERA and 21 strikeouts—but +155 is a better price than Elly at +135 for a hitter carrying this much damage. Rice has 16 HR, tied with Judge for the Yankees’ team lead, and he has gone deep four times in his last eight games and eight times in his last 20. The underlying page backs the heater: .448 wOBA, .422 xwOBA, .570 wOBAcon, .527 xwOBAcon, 93.4 mph average EV, 55.0% hard-hit rate, 39.4% sweet-spot rate, 20.2% barrel rate, 13.1-degree average launch, 72.2 mph bat speed, 12-degree attack angle and 53.9% ideal attack-angle rate. That is a 3+ HRR profile with teeth. A homer gets him home instantly. A double in front of Judge/Bellinger plus a later run gets him there. Even a walk has more value here because the lineup behind him is built to cash it.
Stewart is today’s Reds return trip with a little less emotional baggage than if we were to have chosen Elly, because he was on that last card’s burned wreckage but actually gave us the exact kind of HRR swing we want. He homered, scored and drove himself in, which is the cleanest possible three-HRR shortcut: hit, run, RBI, done. Today’s setup keeps him in the sweet spot. He is hitting cleanup behind McLain, Elly and Bleday, with Steer and Lowe behind him, so his plate appearances come with both RBI runway and run-scoring support. Nola’s 5.91 ERA gives this Reds lineup a target, and the weather in Philadelphia helps the ball carry instead of turning loud contact into warning-track grief. Stewart’s season Statcast line has the right kind of bite for this market: .249 average, .340 OBP, .475 SLG, .815 OPS, .355 wOBA, .379 xwOBA, .519 xSLG, .227 ISO, .249 xISO, .430 xwOBAcon, 90.6 mph average EV, 41.0% hard-hit rate, 36.1% sweet-spot rate, 17.4% barrel rate and a 14.3-degree launch angle. The bat-tracking layer adds more reason to buy the damage: 71.9 mph bat speed, 11-degree attack angle, 54.8% ideal attack-angle rate and 7.7-foot swing length. Stewart at +145 is so solid. A two-run double nearly gets him home. A homer with anyone aboard buries the number immediately. The role is right, the bat path is right, and the price is still playable.
Rooker is the Oakland play because his price gives us the payoff that Kurtz and Langeliers no longer do. Kurtz at +125 and Langeliers at +115 are asking for too much HRR conversion in the same ecosystem. Rooker at +145 is sitting in the cleanup chair, which is exactly where a hitter like this belongs for 3+ HRR. Carlos Cortes, Shea Langeliers and Nick Kurtz are in front of him, Tyler Soderstrom is behind him, and that gives Rooker a cleaner chance to cash through one crooked inning instead of needing three perfectly spaced plate appearances. The surface line has wobble, which is why the number exists, but the contact profile still has real teeth: .200/.285/.392 with seven HR and two steals, plus a 90.3 mph average EV, 46.8% hard-hit rate, 36.4% sweet-spot rate, 15.8% barrel rate, 20.1-degree launch angle, .223 xISO, .433 xwOBAcon, 73.9 mph bat speed and a 14-degree attack angle. Jack Kochanowicz is giving up the kind of firm contact that keeps this live: .300 wOBA allowed, .365 xwOBA allowed, .383 xwOBAcon allowed, 90.1 mph average EV allowed, 43.0% hard-hit rate allowed, 8.1% barrel rate allowed and a 30.9% sweet-spot rate allowed. Oakland already showed the eruption version of this matchup by hanging 14 in Anaheim. Rooker was part of that mess. At this price, cleanup power in that run environment is the right bet shape.
Trout is the star piece, and +150 is the reason he’s here. Aaron Civale has been good enough on the surface to make this a real decision, but the contact underneath leaves a lane. Civale is allowing a .333 wOBA, .330 xwOBA, 91.3 mph average EV, 48.0% hard-hit rate, 36.2% sweet-spot rate and 6.6% barrel rate. That is enough loud contact allowed for Trout to make this number interesting, especially from the two-hole. Zach Neto is in front of him, while Nolan Schanuel, Jorge Soler, Yoán Moncada and Jo Adell sit behind him, giving Trout both the early RBI chance and the run-scoring ladder if he reaches. His own Statcast profile still looks like a superstar’s damage sheet: .382 wOBA, .418 xwOBA, .512 xwOBAcon, .255 xBA, .578 xSLG, 91.7 mph average EV, 50.9% hard-hit rate, 22.1% barrel rate, 11.8% barrels per plate appearance, 20.4-degree launch angle, 75.1 mph bat speed, 49.0% ideal attack-angle rate and a 19.4% walk rate. The walks only help if the Angels cash them in, which is always the HRR catch, but Trout’s lineup slot gives those free bases a real chance to become runs. At +150, the ceiling, plate volume and lineup context are enough.
Aranda is the prettiest number on the card. +180 for a confirmed three-hole bat in a dome is the kind of price that makes the whole board slow down. Tampa has Junior Caminero ahead of him and Yandy Díaz behind him, so Aranda is living in the part of the order where one extra-base hit can turn into multiple scoring events. He gets Shane Baz, who enters 1-5 with a 5.26 ERA and 42 strikeouts in 51.1 innings. That strikeout piece keeps the matchup from being cartoonish, but the run-prevention profile still gives Tampa room to build an inning. Aranda’s Statcast page is more smooth than feral, which is fine at this price: .360 wOBA, .363 xwOBA, 89.4 mph average EV, 42.3% hard-hit rate, 36.6% sweet-spot rate, 9.8% barrel rate and a 14.1-degree launch angle. He gives you a more complete HRR shape than the odds suggest. Caminero at +120 is priced like the obvious button in the same lineup pocket. Aranda at +180 gives you a better payout, a cleaner RBI slot, and enough contact quality to cash through a double, a run, a two-RBI swing, or one homer if Baz misses in the wrong place. The dome matters, too. No rain delay, no weird wind tax, no weather headache. Just a middle-order bat at a number that should probably be shorter.
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