Baltimore Orioles star Gunnar Henderson is one of three players featured in Friday night's top MLB prop picks.
The pregame narrative: Henderson should do damage in a juicy matchup against the San Diego Padres. In addition to Henderson, I have plays on pitchers Kyle Freeland and Carson Fulmer.
Check out these MLB prop bets for July 26.
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Best bet: Henderson over 1.5 total bases (-109)
Aaron Judge is rightfully the heavy AL MVP favourite. But behind him on the board are two Home Run Derby participants: Henderson and Bobby Witt Jr. (both at +600).
Henderson enters tonight third in MLB in homers and 10th in OPS. He especially punishes righties and faces one that's been feasted on.
The Padres are deploying rookie right-hander Adam Mazur, who has a 7.84 ERA through his first seven MLB starts.
Mazur has allowed four-plus runs and six-plus hits in three consecutive games. He has one quality start that came in his MLB debut against a weak Los Angeles Angels club.
The Orioles aren't the Angels. Baltimore is tied for second in the majors in wRC+ and ranks first in homers. Henderson, the club's leadoff man, is the driving force of this dangerous offence.
Henderson has just one extra-base hit since the Derby, but Mazur represents an excellent breakout spot. Opposing batters are hitting .306 and slugging .524 against the 23-year-old.
Key stat: The Orioles shortstop is one of eight players who have cleared this line in at least 50% of their games, according to Team Rankings.
Quick picks
Freeland under 4.5 Ks (-148): Freeland has not looked like the punching bag of old in recent starts, but he's still severely missing swing-and-miss stuff.
The Colorado Rockies lefty has topped this line in two of his last three starts but is 2-7 against it on the season. That includes his last outing against the San Francisco Giants, whom he fanned four times over six frames.
Freeland ranks in the bottom-sixth percentile in K rate, per Baseball Savant, and is coming off a season in which he had a 13.9 K% over 155.2 innings. That was the lowest mark among pitchers who threw that many innings.
San Francisco has one of MLB's highest K rates this month but it has hit lefties better than all but five clubs this season, per wRC+ (115).
Fulmer over 4.5 Ks (-120): Fulmer couldn't clear this line in his last start, which came against these very same Oakland Athletics.
But I like his chances of doing so tonight. The Angels are likely looking for a bit more length out of him after last night's starter, Kenny Rosenberg, only provided 3.1 innings.
And while Fulmer shouldn't be expected to work deep, his K rate is solid enough (23.5%) to make the most of his workload.
This will mark the former first-round pick's third start. He punched out three in his last outing and seven in his first. Before that, he struck out five in his last relief appearance.
Oakland has cut its K rate considerably this month but has the third-highest mark on the season and is second versus righties.
Picks made at 3:45 p.m. ET on 07/26/2024.
