Going into May, the Minnesota Twins were the third-most profitable team in the American League for those who bet the money line on every one of their games and are looking to get a great start from their ace on Thursday.
Jose Berrios has some of the best home splits in baseball since becoming a big-league starter. The Houston Astros hit .221 lifetime against him at Target Field, and he has a 21-10 record in 36 starts there, with a 3.46 ERA and 0.62 home runs surrendered per nine innings.
Meanwhile, Brad Peacock has been a solid starter for an Astros team that has a lot of back-end support. Peacock is allowing just one home run per nine innings and is backed up by the lone bullpen that had an ERA under 3.00 entering May.
The Twins’ bullpen is in the bottom half of the league in ERA, but Berrios has gone at least six innings in all six of his starts thus far in 2019 to help mitigate that woe. The Astros also did not exceed four runs in any of the five games prior to Tuesday’s 11-run outburst. Both teams have been reliable for keeping totals under this season with 18 of Houston’s first 30 games and 15 of Minnesota’s first 27 staying under.
The play: Twins-Astros Under 8¹/₂ runs.