MLB PrizePicks Predictions Today: Top Plays for Sunday, May 5th
Traditional MLB DFS formats aren’t the only way to profit from daily fantasy baseball. MLB PrizePicks is a great fantasy pick’em site where we can take today’s projections versus theirs and combine two or more baseball predictions for sizeable payouts.
In this space, we’ll explore a few PrizePicks plays for the upcoming MLB slate. This article isn’t the be-all, end-all of great plays or a recommendation for a full ticket; it’s simply a starting place for you to explore thinking about the game within the game. Maybe you want to scatter these plays across entries. Maybe there are only two or three you think are worth playing. Daily fantasy pick’em gives us the flexibility to make only the plays in which we think there is value rather than being forced to create a full lineup while competing against the best DFS players in the industry.
PrizePicks is daily fantasy baseball made simple, and our Fantasy Pick’em Tool makes the process even simpler.
All stats cited are since the start of the 2023 season unless otherwise noted.
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MLB PrizePicks Predictions for Sunday, May 5th
- Bryce Miller LESS Than 5.0 Strikeouts
- Carlos Carrasco LESS Than 4.5 Strikeouts
- Mackenzie Gore LESS Than 5.5 Strikeouts
Bryce Miller LESS Than 5.0 Strikeouts
Bryce Miller has the greatest disparity between his PrizePicks and RG projections. PrizePicks has him at 5.0 and we have him at 3.8 — a 24% difference. 5.0 is a huge number that we need to pounce on. The Astros have struggled to start the season, but their projected lineup is still only striking out 16.9% of the time this season. Add that Miller is getting hit really hard (54.2%) and in the air (36.1% fly-ball rate) for an enormous 14.5% barrel rate, and we should conclude that he shouldn’t last long enough to compile Ks.
Carlos Carrasco LESS Than 4.5 Strikeouts
The Angels strike out a lot, but Carlos Carrasco just isn’t an MLB-caliber pitcher anymore. He’s only had 6.83 K/9, so we’re talking at the very least 6 innings to get to 5 Ks. He has 4.07 BB/9 and has allowed a 9.9% barrel rate. There’s no honest projection that will give him the volume to get to 5 Ks, even if the stuff was somewhat present. We have Carrasco projected for only 3.6 Ks. He should get knocked out of this game early. Maybe even earlier than Miller.
Mackenzie Gore LESS Than 5.5 Strikeouts
Mackenzie Gore is becoming, but we’re not sure exactly what yet. Until we’re sure, he’s still in the category of a pitcher I would expect to get under 5.5 strikeouts against a Jays projected lineup that only strikes out 16.8% of the time (and 14.8% this season). Sure, Gore has 11.03 K/9 and the Jays don’t really beat anyone down, but we shouldn’t be completely convinced of Gore’s baked-in strikeout stuff to trust him for 6 strikeouts. He’s only gone 6 innings once this season. We have Gore projected for a more realistic 4.6 Ks on the day.
All projections referenced are accurate at the time of writing but subject to change.
Writing this in the wee hours of the morning, there aren’t any pitcher outs or hitter DEMON boosts posted just yet. We should like the Angels, Astros, and Nationals bats a lot for total bases. If we’re feeling frisky, Rafael Devers and Jose Ramirez don’t have the best matchups, but they’re great hitters facing vulnerable pitching — Joe Ryan to fly balls and Griffin Canning to barrels; those two could come in underprojected across the board. Ryan Pepiot for LESS than 6.0 Ks against the Mets is a solid play, and we should be curious to see where Freddy Peralta lands on the DEMON boost for Ks. Joe Ryan at MORE than 7.0 Ks is more tempting than the Peralta projection, as Ryan projects for 7.7 Ks to Peralta’s 7.2. The Red Sox strike out more than the Cubs, so that’s a play to which we should have some exposure.
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