Kansas City Royals vs. Seattle Mariners Best Bet: Can Emerson Hancock, Mariners Bounce Back?

Kansas City Royals vs. Seattle Mariners Best Bet: Can Emerson Hancock, Mariners Dominate?

Last night the Seattle Mariners had one of their brightest young pitchers on the mound, but Logan Gilbert was not very effective as he allowed three earned runs in the first inning and allowed four total earned runs in just 4 and 1/3rds innings of work. This was Gilbert’s shortest outing in nearly two months, and it was extremely surprising that it came against the Kansas City Royals, who has been one of the league’s worst teams this year.

Royals vs. Mariners Date, Time, and Where to Watch

• Date: August 15, 2023
• Time: 8:10 pm ET
• Where to Watch: MLB.TV

Kansas City Royals vs. Seattle Mariners Prediction

While the Royals are in full rebuild mode, evidenced by their 39-81 record, they have been playing very well over the last couple of weeks. They are 7-6 in the month of August and are 10-6 over their last 16 games, so they have been showing improvement through some of their young prospects who are getting valuable playing time at the moment. The Royals are led by superstar shortstop Bobby Witt Jr., who probably doesn’t get the recognition he truly deserves simply because he is stuck in Kansas City.

Witt Jr. already has 30+ stolen bases and has a great shot to hit 30+ homers to go along with a .277 average and a .810 OPS. While Witt Jr. and the young Royals' core have been playing better, they have a tall task in front of them tonight against another young ace in the making in Emerson Hancock.

Hancock is a very highly touted prospect who did not disappoint in his first career start against the San Diego Padres, as he only allowed one earned run across five innings. Hancock’s control was a bit of an issue as he did walk three hitters, but some of that can be attributed to first-game jitters, and I do not believe that will be an issue for him moving forward. More importantly, Hancock only allowed two hits across those five innings, so he avoided hard contact. I expect another strong start from him tonight against a subpar overall Royals lineup.

On the other side for the Royals is Jordan Lyles, who is having a tough season, to say the least. Lyles comes into this start with a record of 3-13 and an ERA of 6.13. Lyles is the definition of an innings eater for this Kansas City squad as he frequently gets hit hard but does go fairly deep into games as he has gone at least five innings in ten straight starts and has tossed 6+ innings in six of his last ten starts. While Lyles does eat a lot of innings and saves the bullpen at times, he does get hit extremely hard and will be facing a Seattle lineup who is bound for some positive regression.

Seattle has lost their last three games while only scoring nine total runs in those contests. Still, prior to that, they were one of the hotter teams in the American League as they had won eight in a row against some solid competition, including the Boston Red Sox, Los Angeles Angels, San Diego Padres, and the Baltimore Orioles. Seattle was down 5-0 last night deep into the eighth inning and nearly came back to win as they had a lead in the ninth but could not hold on.

I think they should be able to take some of that eighth/ninth inning momentum from last night and turn in a strong performance from start to finish tonight against Lyles behind a strong performance from Emerson Hancock. With that being said, I am rolling with Seattle F5 ML at -117 and Seattle Full Game ML at -134 for 1U each as my most confident MLB plays of the day for tonight’s action.

Kansas City Royals vs. Seattle Mariners Best Bet

• 1U Seattle F5 ML -117 is currently the best odds. Click here to see which sportsbook has the best odds for this pick
• 1U Seattle Full Game ML -134 is currently the best odds. Click here to see which sportsbook has the best odds for this pick

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