Baltimore Orioles vs Arizona Diamondbacks Pick – 4/8/2025

Baltimore Orioles vs Arizona Diamondbacks Betting Preview

As the Arizona Diamondbacks host the Baltimore Orioles at Chase Field on April 8, 2025, both teams find themselves in a similar predicament. With matching records of 5-6, both clubs are currently underperforming, but the Diamondbacks are slightly favored to turn things around, boasting the 11th best offense in MLB. This matchup also marks the second game of the series, adding extra intrigue following yesterday’s contest.

Merrill Kelly is projected to take the mound for the Diamondbacks. Despite his current standing as the 212th best pitcher according to advanced metrics, there are signs of hope. His 10.00 ERA suggests struggles, but his lower xFIP of 7.96 indicates he may have been unlucky and could improve moving forward. Kelly projects to pitch an average of 5.2 innings today, allowing about 3.1 earned runs, which, while not ideal, reflects an opportunity for a bounce-back performance.

On the other side, Charlie Morton of the Orioles looks to snap a rough start to the season, carrying an 0-2 record and a 9.72 ERA. His stellar strikeout rate of 31.7% could be mitigated by the Diamondbacks' low strikeout rate, ranked 6th in MLB, providing a potential advantage for Arizona.

With a high Game Total of 9.0 runs and the Diamondbacks’ moneyline set at -120, sports bettors may find value in backing Arizona to capitalize on their home field advantage and break free from their current rut against a struggling Morton.

Quick Takes Baltimore Orioles:

Despite conventional wisdom, fastballs are generally a pitcher's least effective pitch. Charlie Morton has used his off-speed and breaking balls 12.9% less often this season (48.3%) than he did last year (61.2%).

• Fastballs are the one easiest pitches to hit and generate few strikeouts, so a pitcher who begins to use his fastball more often will likely be less effective than he used to be.

Extreme flyball batters like Jackson Holliday are generally more successful against extreme groundball pitchers like Merrill Kelly.

• This mostly has to do with the way the hitter's swing plane interacts with the pitch trajectory, and it can create boosted performance across all categories and hidden value few are considering.

Ryan Mountcastle has a 95th percentile opposite-field rate on his flyballs (38.2%) and has the misfortune of hitting them in the direction of MLB's 3rd-deepest RF fences today.

• This player's skill set does not match up particularly well with the park he's in today, which may lead to worse-than-usual performance.

Quick Takes Arizona Diamondbacks:

Merrill Kelly's 2380.9-rpm fastball spin rate since the start of last season is in the 79th percentile out of all starting pitchers.

• Spin rate is a key component to fastball success in generating strikeouts and preventing runs.

Geraldo Perdomo has primarily hit in the back-half of the lineup this season (55% of the time), but he is projected to bat 2nd in the batting order today.

• The higher in the order a player bats, the more plate appearances he will get and the more opportunities he will get to hit the Over for every market. A player who hits higher in the order than he normally does may provide extra value opportunity since the market may be based on him hitting lower.

The Arizona Diamondbacks have been the luckiest offense in Major League Baseball since the start of last season, according to the leading projection system (THE BAT X), and are likely to hit worse in the future

• When teams overperform their projected talent level, markets may overvalue them even while they are likely to perform worse in the near future.

Game Trends

• The Arizona Diamondbacks have hit the Game Total Over in 79 of their last 129 games (+28.75 Units / 20% ROI)
• The Baltimore Orioles have hit the Game Total Over in 83 of their last 154 games (+17.80 Units / 11% ROI)
• Cedric Mullins has hit the Singles Over in 7 of his last 10 away games (+5.50 Units / 55% ROI)

• Date: April 8, 2025
• Venue: Chase Field
• Starting Pitchers:
  • Charlie Morton - Orioles
  • Merrill Kelly - D-Backs

For more on today's game check out the comprehensive statistics, betting odds, and trends below. Be sure to check out all our free MLB picks here.