It's Thursday, and you know what that means. We've got a reduced slate of MLB games — and many on the schedule with early afternoon starts — as several teams are traveling to their weekend destinations. Still, we've got a trio of intriguing prop bet selections to whet your whistle through the evening.
We're specifically highlighting Jazz Chisholm to take advantage of a rusty returning pitcher and for Max Fried to thoroughly and completely dominate the Pittsburgh Pirates. Finally, we expect Orioles righty Jordan Lyles to get lit up once more.
Let's dive in with our three favorite player prop picks for Thursday's slate of MLB games.
MLB props for June 9
Picks made on 6/9/2022 at 12:30 p.m. ET.
Click on each pick to jump to the full analysis.
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Today’s best MLB prop bets
The odds widgets below represent the best odds currently available for each betting market at regulated sportsbooks.
Jazz plays the hits
Washington Nationals right-hander, Stephen Strasburg, has thrown a grand total of 26 2-3 innings since the beginning of the 2020 season and hasn't appeared on an MLB mound since June 1, 2021. After more than a year away dealing with injuries, Strasburg makes his return tonight against the Miami Marlins. It's not going to go well.
Well, not for him, anyway.
Jazz Chisholm's overall slash line of .248/.307/.528 doesn't look like anything special, but when you factor in just how badly he's fared against lefties (.069 batting average), the .288 he's hitting against righties is much nicer. Of his 38 base hits against right-handed hurlers, 20 have gone for extra bases.
Strasburg will almost certainly be handled with a short leash tonight as he eases his way back from a long-term injury. A former strikeout artist, Strasburg wasn't missing many bats before being sidelined and has been more prone to the gopher ball dating back to 2018 than he was earlier in his career.
Chisholm has a lot of all-or-nothing in his approach, but he makes a lot of contact. Generally, he won't get on base via the walk (7.8%), either, so if he's doing damage, he's swinging the stick.
He bats leadoff, tortures righties, and has enough speed to either beat out an infield single on a slow grounder or turn singles into doubles. And when Strasburg ultimately leaves early due to a strict pitch count, he will give way to a taxed Nationals bullpen that has already thrown the sixth-most innings in baseball (227) and has the fifth-highest ERA (4.60).
Pick: Jazz Chisholm Over 1.5 total bases (+120)
Atlanta Fried Pirates
Max Fried isn't flashy, but he gets the job done. He's coming off a start where he twirled eight scoreless innings against the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field. Only six qualified starters have better walk rates than his 4.6%. Fried lives in the zone and limits hard contact well, ranking within the 82nd percentile in average exit velocity while forcing batters to chase at an elite rate, according to Baseball Savant.
The lefty is also forcing opponents to chase more frequently than all but two other starters (Kevin Gausman and Carlos Carrasco) as he's inducing swings outside the zone 39.1% of the time. When contact is made on these pitches, it's not hard.
Cue the visiting Pittsburgh Pirates get to him? At 24-30, the Buccos are punching a bit above their weight class, which says something about how low expectations were entering the season. One thing they do particularly poorly is hit left-handed pitchers. The Pirates are hitting .227 against southpaws (22nd in MLB) with an 89 weighted runs created plus (T23).
Atlanta has baseball's best bullpen in terms of FanGraphs, WAR, and strikeout rate, and it helps that the relief corps has an innings-eater like Fried who can reliably hurl around 100 pitches when he takes the mound. The Pirates don't draw a lot of walks against lefties (7.9% walk rate, 25th in MLB), so that's an unlikely avenue to cause Fried trouble. As a result, pitching into the seventh inning and retiring at least 19 batters is a fantastic proposition at plus money.
Pick: Max Fried Over 18.5 outs recorded (+105)
Royals hit for Lyles and Lyles
Jordan Lyles does not miss bats. Period.
The Baltimore Orioles right-hander has served up 73 hits, more than all but two pitchers in baseball, in 62 innings this season. He's like Fried in the sense that he pitches in and around the strike zone and doesn't issue a ton of walks. However, unlike Fried, he gets hit around the park.
Lyles is among the worst in baseball at limiting hard contact and suppressing barrels, per Baseball Savant, and he goes up against one of the most contact-heavy lineups in the Kansas City Royals.
The Royals strike out just 20.6% of the time thanks in large part to players like Andrew Benintendi, who is batting .326 with a 14.9% strikeout rate vs. right-handers.
Lyles' hits allowed total is listed at a lofty 6.5, but it's also a number he's cleared in six of 11 starts. He's also been absolutely creamed in his last two outings, allowing nine hits apiece to the Seattle Mariners and Boston Red Sox. I like the hit parade to continue at Kauffman Stadium.
Pick: Jordan Lyles Over 6.5 hits allowed (+126)
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