Tough loss on the Braves on Sunday Night Baseball. I was frustrated last night as variance has not been on our side this year, but I’m too excited about today to care.

I have a total and a team total for us to attack today. Let’s go ahead and get after it.

If anyone is interested in my NFL Futures (+35.25 Units in 2023), click here.

2024 Record: 110-113 (-6.76 U)

St. Louis Cardinals vs. Milwaukee Brewers @ 2:15 PM EST

Pitching Matchup: Andre Pallante (3.80 ERA) vs. Freddy Peralta (3.70 ERA)

I keep coming back to my guy Andre Pallante, the ground-ball king. However, I’m not about to take the Cardinals on the road against Freddy Peralta and a bullpen that got a rest day yesterday. It’s the first game on a labor day slate, you know this game is going under.

I’ve turned into an Andre Pallante fan. His ability to keep the ball on the ground is special, rocking the highest ground-ball rate in the league. The floor on a starting pitcher is so high, and espewcially when his Hard-Hit rate is above average, the contact usually is softer. Even if there are runners on base, with the Cardinals defense especially, the double play is always on the table.

Pallante has also been fantastic on the road this season, rocking a 2.86 ERA compared to a 4.66 ERA at home. We even took the under in his last home start, which cashed for us. He’s been on a roll no matter the park against really tough matchups.

He’s faced elite offenses in four straight starts, tallying 24.2 innings and only allowing seven earned runs. This month, even with a five-run outing against the Mets (that game went under), he has a 3.30 ERA.

The Brewers’ offense has been good, not great, against right-handed pitching lately. They rank 14th in wRC+ against righties over the last two weeks at 108, 8% better than the league average. Over the last 30 days, they have a 119 wRC+. It’s clearly a good offense, but they don’t have an easy matchup against high leverage bullpen arms and Andre Pallante.

I project Pallante for six innings while allowing two runs, his average outing this month. Behind Pallante, we have Ryan Helsley (2.34 ERA), Andrew Kittredge (3.18 ERA), Ryan Fernandez (3.32 ERA), and Matthew Liberatore, who has a 2.50 ERA in August in the bullpen. I see the Brewers putting up at most four runs in this game.

The Cardinals get a date with Freddy Peralta, who has been disappointing this year because he’s so talented. However, he’s been on a heater over his last three starts, and I want in on the action. In his previous 17 innings, he’s allowed nine hits and one earned run, and his strikeout stuff was on full display in his last start.

Even with St Louis’ offensive outburst this weekend, over the last two weeks, they have a 116 wRC+. In such a short sample, they still aren’t a top-five offense against righties. I think the series against the Yankees was a bit flukey for how St Louis has hit this year, and now they go up against Freddy Peralta and a Brewers bullpen that essentially got an off-day yesterday.

This game ends 4-3 in favor of Milwaukee, but the money line is expensive for the Brewers. We could see an upside for one of these teams to struggle on offense, especially the Cardinals, where their OPS in the day drops 40 points.

I would take this total down to 7.5 (-110), as I don’t see more than seven runs being scored in this one.

The Pick: Under 8 (-120) Risk 1.2 Units

Pittsburgh Pirates vs. Chicago Cubs @ 7:40 PM EST

Pitching Matchup: Jared Jones (3.88 ERA) vs. Jameson Taillon (3.85 ERA)

The Cubs offense is too hot to have a 3.5-team total. The wind blowing in at Wrigley will hurt the offense, but the wind won’t keep me off the Cubs bats today. I prefer to take Jameson Taillon out of the equation and focus on the Cubs’ prolific offense lately.

The Cubs have put up 99 runs in a ten-game span. That’s the most in a ten-game span since 2010 and the second most since 1970. We are reaching historically hot levels of offense, and recently, they’ve taken the number one spot over the Diamondbacks, who have been the hottest team in baseball.

Over the last two weeks against right-handed pitching. The Cubs have a 144 wRC+, 9% better than the second-place Diamondbacks and 44% better than the league average offense. They haven’t been quite as good against lefties, putting up a 112 wRC+, so in this hot stretch, we get them in their preferred split.

Jared Jones’ last start was against these Cubs’ where he allowed five earned runs. I think Jones is a tad overrated. He racks up strikeouts, but the Cubs aren’t striking out at all lately. He’s mainly a two pitch guy, relying on his four-seam and slider for 86% of his pitch mix. His fastball has a .356 xwOBA against it, so regression is coming for his heater.

Typically, I’ll lean towards the pitcher to make an adjustment after facing an offense recently, but this is also his second start since returning from an injury and I don’t know how he makes an adjustment here.

Even if Jones is adequate, we get to tee off this Pirates bullpen that is a bottom three unit in baseball. Jones has a 15.5 outs line juiced towards the under as it’s expected the Pirates will limit the young pitcher’s workload.

We should get three or more innings against this bullpen, and I don’t trust any of the arms they’ll bring in. I also expect the Cubs to get the lead off Jones, so they’ll be even less inclined to throw their better arms.

Wind is the only factor that would make me nervous in this game. It will be blowing in 10 MPH from center field, but the Cubs haven’t been relying on the home run anyway.

They can hit it out of the park, but the way they’ve been scoring is by taking walks and everyone doing their part to drive them home. Jones’ walk rate is average, and the Cubs aren’t striking out, so we should see base runners consistently early and late. Four runs should be attainable, even with the wind blowing in.

The Pick: Cubs Team Total Over 3.5 (-130) Risk 1.3 Units

These picks are available on BetMGM. Code “JustBaseball” for a first bet offer up to $1500.