Chicago White Sox vs. Houston Astros Game 1 Prediction and Pick

Chicago White Sox vs. Houston Astros Game 1 Prediction and Pick

Chicago White Sox vs. Houston Astros Game 1 Probable Pitchers

• White Sox: Lance Lynn (11-6, 2.69 ERA)
• Astros: Lance McCullers Jr. (13-5, 3.16 ERA

White Sox vs. Astros odds - ALDS Game 1

Chicago White Sox vs. Houston Astros Game 1 Prediction

The White Sox have one of the more balanced teams in all of baseball. They can beat you with starting pitching, they can beat you with a dominant bullpen and on top of all that, the White Sox have ridiculous power up and down the lineup.

However, the White Sox will be sending out Lance Lynn for the first game of the season. This is where things get tricky. Lynn has been dominant all year. He’s allowed a 2.69 ERA throughout the entire season and was one of the top five best pitchers in the game.

To put it lightly, Lynn has struggled against the Astros throughout his career. In one start this season, Lynn took a loss after going four innings while allowing eight hits and six runs and an OBA of .400.

Outside of Carlos Correa and Yuli Gurriel, the Astros lineup has destroyed Lynn.

Check this Astros lineup against Lynn throughout their careers.

• Jose Altuve has gone 13-for-34 (.382) with five extra base hits including two home runs.
• Michael Brantley has gone 10-for-26 (.385) with two doubles and a home run.
• Alex Bregman is 6-for-15 (.400) against Lynn with two home runs and four other extra base hits.
• Yordan Alvarez is batting .455 with a home run against Lynn.
• Yuli Gurriel is batting .190 but does have two home runs in 21 at-bats.
• Carlos Correa is just 1-for-12 with nine strikeouts.
• Kyle Tucker is 1-for-5 with an RBI, walk, and just one strikeout.
• Jake Meyers hasn’t faced Lynn for his career.
• Martin Maldonado is 7-for-14 against Lynn with a home run.

In the last 30 days, the Astros are hitting 24.8 percent line drives and striking out just under 17 percent of the time against righties. The lineup is also hitting an ISO of .173 and wOBA of .351 during that same time frame.

On the other hand, Lynn has been dominant in the last 30 days with an xFIP of 3.23 and strikeout rate of 28.6 percent. He’s limited walks, getting enough ground balls and limiting line drives to under 20 percent of the time in the last 30 days.

Against his last 41 lefties, Lynn has allowed a .179 ISO and a wOBA of .289. If anything, he hasn’t been perfect against lefties this season, although his strikeouts are much to lefties than righties, when lefties connect, there’s a chance a hit can leave the yard.

The Astros are a balanced lineup with three lefties and six righties. The lefties have serious power while the righties can get on base by putting the ball in play more frequently.

At home, I like the Astros to get to Lynn early as they’ve had so much success against him recently. Meanwhile, Lance McCullers will take the hill for the Astros and he’s held the White Sox to a 2.08 ERA in two starts this season.

Through 13 innings, the White Sox scraped him for just four hits and three runs. That’s an OBA of .103. McCullers has been walking nearly 10 percent of batters in the last 30 days and that’s something he’ll have to limit in the postseason, but McCullers is also very capable of earning a strikeout or inducing a double play.

Let’s take the Astros in the first five innings on the moneyline, at home, with the pitcher that has the much better track record against the opposition.

Chicago White Sox vs. Houston Astros Game 1 Bet: Astros F5 ML @ -128