MLB Picks & Odds: Cardinals vs. Giants Prediction

MLB Picks: St. Louis Cardinals vs. San Francisco Giants Prediction

Date: July 7

Time: 9:45pm ET

Where: Oracle Park

Click here to view the latest odds

Cardinals vs. Giants Probable Pitchers

• Cardinals: Johan Oviedo (0-4, 5.14 ERA)
• Giants: Alex Wood (7-3, 3.89 ERA)

In San Francisco, it’s going to be windy. With 23 mph winds and temperature at just 60 degrees at first pitch, this isn’t exactly the best hitting weather.

But there’s still reason to believe a 53-win Giants team can score runs in this one.

Johan Oviedo will take the mound for the Cardinals. He’s 0-4 with a 5.14 ERA and has never won a game in the big leagues.

In 49 innings pitched this season, Oviedo has allowed 50 hits, 26 walks and 33 runs with seven home runs and just 37 strikeouts.

In his last start, Oviedo escaped the Rockies going six innings while allowing three runs and seven hits including a walk and just two strikeouts.

Oviedo has now allowed three or more runs in eight of his 11 starts this year.  He’s also gone beyond five innings in just two starts this season.

Those two starts were against borderline offenses in Miami and Colorado. Now he’ll take on the Giants who will be able to stack lefties against the right-hander.

In his last 45 plate appearances against lefties, Oviedo is allowing a .431 wOBA and a .184 ISO. He’s also striking out under nine percent of those lefties while walking 15.6 percent of them.

You’d expect the Giants to bat LaMonte Wade, Mike Yastrzemski, Alex Dickerson, Brandon Crawford and Steven Duggar. With a pitcher having to bat, that means five of the eight hitters would be batting from the left side.

Oviedo has been better against righties, holding a wOBA of .315 in his last 42 plate appearances against. Yet, still, righties are hitting an ISO of .225 and have power against him from the right side.

His strikeouts are higher at 21.4 percent against righties and walks have been limited to 4.8 percent but the likely three right-handed batters he’ll face have all limited strikeouts against righties recently.

Wilmer Flores is striking out just 6.8 percent of the time while Donovan Solano strikes out just 12 percent of the time against righties in the last 30 days. Even Buster Posey, the third righty in the lineup is striking out just 20 percent of the time in the last 30 days against right-handed batters.

What I’m getting at is that the Giants should be able to put the ball in play and get on base plenty against Oviedo, who has a WHIP of 1.55 and a SIERA of 5.33.

On the other hand, Alex Wood will take on the Cardinals. He’s allowing just under 40 percent hard contact himself recently and hasn’t been the best against righties as he has walked 13.3 percent in the last 30 days.

Righties are currently hitting an exit velocity average of 92.5 percent and Wood is allowing a BABIP of .324 in the last 30 days. Against lefties, he’s had trouble inducing ground balls despite his high strikeout rate and low walk rate.

The Cardinals offense has not been great this season and really have struggled recently but the bats in the lineup have had success against lefties previously.

Bats like Nolan Arenado and Paul DeJong have solid power against lefties. The entire projected lineup has only struck out 15.7 percent of the time while walking over 10 percent.

The weather will be a bit of a boost to the pitchers but the reality is Oviedo is going to walk batters and put runners on base. The Giants just need one or two clutch hits against Oviedo and they’ll be good to go in the first five innings.

So let’s take the team total over in the first five innings for the Giants. Oviedo has allowed three or more runs in eight of his 11 starts this season. I’m expecting the same tonight.

MLB Picks: St. Louis Cardinals vs. San Francisco Giants Prediction: Giants F5 TT Over 2.5 @ -110