Every new Major League Baseball season starts off with optimism. The catch is, early season baseball can be a trap when it comes to baseball odds and props.
Ballparks are open again, arms are fresh, there’s a hotshot rookie in the starting lineup, and baseball is just back.
ERAs are at 0.00. Injuries don’t exist. Fans of long-suffering teams had 5 months to get that annual amnesia they need to dream again.
Lucky Rebel’s MLB betting lines are fresh too.
Check out the latest odds at Lucky Rebel
Everyone’s 0–0, but Not Everyone’s Equal
Truth is, no matter how many moves a GM makes in the offseason – trading for fresh roster talent, farm system depth, and other front office chess moves – they don’t magically come together after just a few weeks in Florida or Arizona in March.
That doesn’t stop the media though. Talking heads and social media types have spent the October-April period hyping up certain MLB players and teams. We get it – it’s a business.
The moves a GM has made to snag a five-tool player have been praised and analyzed. That free agent bullpen closer was signed to a mega-deal. But guess what? Everyone’s 0-0.
You hear all the optimism from the fan bases and dugouts. Clean slates are as clean as they’re going to get, until reality sets in for half the league by the middle of May.
Betting lines for early season MLB games are based on a mix of stats from last year and the team’s additions since then. Sportsbooks are susceptible to the hype too. Inflated lines draw more narrative and more money in one team’s direction.
In other words, be wary. There are some great opportunities, as there always are when betting conditions are like the Wild West.
But being slower on the draw isn’t a bad idea. And sharps know this about MLB betting.
They’re also wary of the books shading the lines towards the “why not us?” narrative.
Translation: the optimism surrounding some teams is way overcooked, but the betting public is programmed into giving those teams too much love anyway.
Cold Bats and Shaky Bullpens Rule April
Rust is inevitable in baseball.
The top hitters need reps during the 162-game season, taking almost daily bullpens. But players aren’t taking their cuts as much over the winter.
And a lot of their winter pitchers were machines, not live humans. This translates to cold bats in April.
At the same time, pitching is also rusty. Coaches are testing out their bullpens early in the season, seeing who’s got a live arm in middle relief and who can close with authority.
This, combined with strict pitch counts for starting pitchers, leaves pitching really tough for smart MLB bettors to get a handle on.
Thanks to sabermetrics, these pitch counts and plenty of other micro stats are tightly adhered to by managers.
This takes away (too early, in our opinion) a hot starting pitcher who’s throwing darts. So sharps looking to rely on an ace to win the game have to consider that he might not make it past the 6th inning.
We get it. It’s a long season and teams want to keep their pitchers throwing deep into September and hopefully October.
But we also get baseball betting. For Opening Day MLB action and well into the first half of April, we know Lucky Rebel players need to be selective with their wagers.
It comes down to volatility. Just like the stock market likes stability, bettors like to know what they’re dealing with when it comes to pitching and hitting. Of course, Lucky Rebel players know that chaos can lead to opportunity.
Those inflated lines are one spot to look at.
Another one comes from the ‘pen. Since coaches are still doing all that trial and error, you could see more blown saves and late-inning scoring swings. Live MLB betting could come in handy here, where you take bigger odds late in the game.
Why Smart Money Stays Selective Early
Restraint is tough for any sports fan after a long offseason.
We miss the box scores, the drama, the 5-leg parlays that hit.
But restraint in the opening weeks of major league baseball is key to a sustainable season-long MLB betting strategy.
It’s a landmine in those early days. Chasing hunches or hyped teams is not recommended.
The smart money stays selective by looking at matchups over brand names. By targeting mismatches like an ace pitcher on an underdog who owned the opposing team’s hitters last season.
Lucky Rebel knows that even the best Sportsbooks are only operating off the previous season’s numbers to set the lines in the early weeks of MLB.
Sure, you can bet that last year’s Cy Young winner might win his first outing. Or that Aaron Judge will start mashing from Opening Day.
But even those bets are based on old data, and they don’t factor in anything current about the opposing team. They can’t, it’s too early.
Take the Marlins-Pirates Opening Day game last season as just one example:
- The run-line was at 1.5 in favor of the Marlins.
- The Marlins were also almost 10 wins better than Pittsburgh in the previous season.
- The O/U for runs scored was 7.5. With both teams starting their top pitchers, it was expected to be a low-scoring game.
- Moneyline: -129 Miami.
- Final? 6-5 Pirates. 4 runs over the O/U and a spread-beating underdog wins outright.
Bettors who went all-in on the Marlins for Opening Day would have lost cash right out of the gate.
Play the Long Game
Of all the major sports, MLB is the definition of a marathon, not a sprint.
162 games on every MLB team’s schedule. 30 teams. That’s 2,430 games in total.
MLB Opening Day and the early weeks that follow are more of a study session than a payday for the smart Lucky Rebel bettors.
They wait for real edges and trends to emerge and then make their moves.
We like to celebrate the start of the new season with a cool one, not a cold streak.