Cleveland Guardians vs Milwaukee Brewers Pick & Preview – 8/18/2024

• Date: August 18, 2024
• Venue: American Family Field
• Starting Pitchers:
  • Ben Lively - Guardians
  • Colin Rea - Brewers

Betting Odds

Cleveland Guardians vs Milwaukee Brewers Win Probabilities

Implied Win % in sports betting represent the probability of an outcome as suggested by the betting odds. It's a way for bettors to gauge the likelihood of an event occurring based on the odds offered by sportsbooks.

Projected Win %, also known as projected win probability, is an estimate by ATS.io to determine the likelihood that a team will win a game or event. This projection is often based on various factors such as team performance, statistics, and historical data.

Cleveland Guardians vs Milwaukee Brewers Betting Preview

As the Milwaukee Brewers and Cleveland Guardians prepare for their third game of the series on August 18, 2024, both teams are in strong positions in the standings, with the Brewers at 71-52 and the Guardians at 72-51. This matchup not only showcases two teams having great seasons but also brings playoff implications into focus, given their competitive records.

In their previous encounter on August 17, the Brewers edged out the Guardians with a narrow 2-1 victory, which highlighted both teams' competitive nature. Colin Rea is projected to take the mound for the Brewers, coming off a rough outing where he allowed 7 earned runs in his last start. Despite being ranked as the 215th best starting pitcher in MLB, Rea's ERA of 3.72 shows that he can still be effective, although his 4.36 xFIP suggests he might be due for a regression.

On the other side, the Guardians will send Ben Lively to the hill. Lively has struggled in his recent appearance as well, giving up 3 earned runs in just 4 innings. Both pitchers rank among the lower echelons of MLB starters, which could lead to a high-scoring affair.

The Brewers boast the 9th best offense in MLB, supported by Willy Adames, their standout hitter this season, while the Guardians sit at a middle-of-the-pack 15th. The projections indicate that the Brewers are anticipated to score 4.59 runs on average, while the Guardians are projected for 4.95 runs. With the Brewers currently favored at -120 odds and an implied team total of 4.35 runs, this game promises to be a tightly contested battle.

Quick Takes Cleveland Guardians:

Will Brennan has primarily hit in the back-half of the batting order this season (54% of the time), but he is projected to hit 2nd in the batting order in today's game.

• 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.

In today's game, Jose Ramirez is at a disadvantage facing the league's 8th-deepest RF fences given that he hits his flyballs to the pull field at a 41.5% rate (99th percentile).

• 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 Milwaukee Brewers:

Colin Rea has gone to his slider 6.3% more often this year (17%) than he did last year (10.7%).

• Because sliders are one of the most effective pitches to use, a pitcher who alters his pitch mix to use more of them will often see more success as a result.

Brice Turang may have an advantage against every reliever for the duration of the game, since the bullpen of the Cleveland Guardians only has 1 same-handed RP.

• Hitters perform worse against pitchers of the same handedness (i.e. righty-vs-righty), and being able to avoid those matchups against the bullpen boosts performance and creates hidden edge.

The Milwaukee Brewers have been the 2nd-luckiest offense in Major League Baseball this year, according to the leading projection system (THE BAT X), and are likely to hit worse in future games

• 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 Milwaukee Brewers have hit the Game Total Over in 67 of their last 123 games (+13.95 Units / 10% ROI)
• The Cleveland Guardians have hit the Team Total Under in 21 of their last 30 away games (+10.60 Units / 30% ROI)
• Josh Naylor has hit the RBIs Over in 11 of his last 18 games (+9.25 Units / 51% ROI)

Cleveland Guardians vs Milwaukee Brewers Prediction

Final Score: Cleveland Guardians 4.95 vs Milwaukee Brewers 4.59

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