Aikido Picks 4/26
Program wanted to go under six times today. Given this is when it gets warm and totals start going up, that’s potentially worrisome, but unders are indeed good in general and the numbers here are generally quite good. As a precaution, I am going to get rid of one of them, but given we’re doing so well I’m going to leave the other five, noting that the Athletics/Rays line is on the margin and could easily be skipped.
As of 4/24’s games we are 43-26-4, +20.1 units, +27.5% hold. Usual reminder that this is an absurd win rate, the majority of it is luck no matter how good we are, and it won’t be sustained.
Today’s picks are mostly straightfoward, and the procedures should be well established by now. The big question is how far to push the unders, and how much to push some of the marginal moneylines as well. Brewers -169 and Reds +156 would be good plays in a lower-juice world like we had 10 years ago, or if you could do aggressive line shopping and wait for different books to have different lines, but right now the prices on those feel too high at these margins.
Thus, here are our picks:
901 Cubs +163
901/902 Cubs/Braves Under 8+103
Cubs games early even not at Wrigley require extra edge on totals but this gives us that edge with room to spare.
903 Marlins/Brewers Over 6.5-113
Balancing bet, so it’s fine even a little thin.
907/908 Rockies/Giants Under 8-109
Standard.
911 Royals/Tigers Under 8+103
912 Tigers -104
Both edges are large here. Could this be too generous to Turnbull? It definitely could be, but win/loss records are not everything (I mean going 4-17 in 2019 is maybe the worst beat I’ve seen given his ERA, including the saga of Jacob DeGrom). I’m willing to believe he’s at 0.4 after his season’s start, or at least close enough that these lines are good.
913 Twins -121
913/914 Twins/Indians Under 7.5-115
Getting both sides of the 7 is a rather large deal, and I think this is enough cents to take the road favorite despite that.
915/916 Yankees/Orioles Over 9-109
916 Orioles +1.5 -106
If we only had access to +147 on the Orioles the decision is close, as the total is off and the edge isn’t that great. Given we can jump to the runline and get an absurd price, our decision is much easier. I wouldn’t be willing to add the moneyline here unless you get a good number, and would accept smaller size as a possible consequence if the runline didn’t come back.
917/918 Athletics/Rays Under 8.5-109
918 Rays +114
We have the Rays as favorites here by virtue of being at home, and that seems reasonable to me. The under doesn’t seem wonderful, and you could easily skip it, but the math says take it. We’re sticking to one unit on everything for simplicity, but this is definitely a case where I’d keep it relatively small.