San Diego Padres vs Tampa Bay Rays Betting Pick & Preview – 9/1/2024

• Date: September 1, 2024
• Venue: Tropicana Field
• Starting Pitchers:
  • Dylan Cease - Padres
  • Ryan Pepiot - Rays

Betting Odds

San Diego Padres vs Tampa Bay Rays 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.

San Diego Padres vs Tampa Bay Rays Betting Preview

On September 1, 2024, the Tampa Bay Rays will host the San Diego Padres at Tropicana Field for the third game of their series. The Rays, sitting at 67-68, are having an average season, while the Padres, with a record of 77-61, are enjoying a good year. This matchup is particularly significant, as both teams are looking to solidify their standings amidst a competitive playoff race.

In their last outing, the Rays faced the Padres and won 11-4 in an offense outburst for Tampa Bay. The Rays will look to Ryan Pepiot, who has shown promise this season with a 3.61 ERA and a solid 7-6 record. However, Pepiot's projections indicate potential struggles, especially as he is expected to allow an average of 4.6 hits and 1.3 walks today, which could spell trouble against a potent Padres lineup.

Dylan Cease, the projected starter for San Diego, comes into the game with a 3.57 ERA and a 12-10 record. Cease's advanced metrics rank him as the 22nd best starting pitcher in MLB, and he projects to strike out an impressive 8.2 batters today. His ability to generate strikeouts will be crucial against a Rays offense that ranks 27th overall and has struggled to produce runs consistently.

The game total is set at a low 7.0 runs, reflecting expectations of a tightly contested battle. With Tampa Bay's offense lacking power—ranking 26th in home runs—and facing a high-flyball pitcher like Cease, the Rays may find it challenging to capitalize on scoring opportunities. Conversely, the Padres, boasting the 1st best batting average in MLB, will aim to exploit any weaknesses in Pepiot's game plan.

Quick Takes San Diego Padres:

Compared to the average pitcher, Dylan Cease has been granted more leash than the typical pitcher this year, tallying an extra 10.7 adjusted pitches each start.

• Pitchers with a longer leash are more likely to go deeper into games and record more outs.

In the last two weeks, David Peralta's Barrel% has experienced a negative regression, plummeting from his seasonal rate of 5.3% down to 0%.

• Barrel% measures how often a player hits the ball at the optimal exit velocity and launch angle and is a terrific measure of underlying power.

In today's matchup, Jackson Merrill is at a disadvantage facing the league's 9th-deepest CF center field fences given that he hits his flyballs towards center field at a 39.4% rate (96th 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 Tampa Bay Rays:

Ryan Pepiot has had positive variance on his side thus far when it comes to his strikeouts this year, posting a 9.46 K/9 despite the leading projection system (THE BAT) estimating his true talent level to be 9.39 — a 0.06 K/9 deviation.

• Pitchers that are overperforming should be expected to pitch worse going forward, which can create value on K prop Unders if the lines are too heavily weighing the lucky, to-date overperformance.

Jose Siri has seen a significant improvement in his exit velocity on flyballs this season; just compare his 96.6-mph average to last year's 94-mph EV.

• Most home runs are flyballs, and the harder those flyballs are hit, the more often they turn into home runs. This is a strong indicator of power.

The Tampa Bay Rays have 3 batters in their projected batting order today with a high (i.e. over 27%) underlying K% (per the leading projection system, THE BAT X) (Josh Lowe, Christopher Morel, Jose Siri).

• Teams that have multiple high-strikeout hitters will make it much easier for the opposing pitcher to record strikeouts

Game Trends

• The Tampa Bay Rays have hit the Team Total Under in 71 of their last 123 games (+14.55 Units / 10% ROI)
• The San Diego Padres have hit the Game Total Over in 40 of their last 67 games (+11.45 Units / 16% ROI)
• Jurickson Profar has hit the Singles Under in 31 of his last 47 games (+12.70 Units / 23% ROI)

San Diego Padres vs Tampa Bay Rays Prediction

Final Score: San Diego Padres 3.68 vs Tampa Bay Rays 3.44

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