The San Diego Padres take on the San Francisco Giants. Check out our MLB odds series for our Padres Giants prediction and pick.
Mike Clevinger gets the starting assignment for the Padres, while Carlos Rodon goes to the bump for the Giants.
Mike Clevinger has a 3.59 ERA, but his path through the season has not been smooth. In two of his last three outings, Clevinger has walked four batters. He was able to pitch around those walks in one of the two outings, limiting the degree of damage done, but he still ran up his pitch count to the point that he couldn’t pitch beyond the fifth inning. If you look at Clevinger’s last five starts, the pitch counts are all very similar — 89 to 97 in all five starts — but Clevinger has pitched varying lengths in those games: three starts of five innings or fewer, two starts of six innings or more . Weeding out the walks makes it possible for Clevinger to eat up a lot more innings and reduce the strain on the San Diego bullpen. The Padres need Clevinger to not only limit what the opponent does on the scoreboard; they need him to eat up six innings per start. Clevinger did that in his most recent outing against the Guardians last week (six innings, two runs allowed), so let’s see if he can stack together two good performances.
Carlos Rodon is the ace of the Giants in 2022. Logan Webb continues to struggle. Rodon is the guy who takes the ball and gives San Francisco what it needs on a regular basis. Rodon is giving the Giants six innings per start — he has been hitting that average in July and August, at any rate — and his ERA for the year is 2.81. Rodon had two bad starts immediately after the All-Star break, and a lot of people wondered if his first half was going to be unsustainable. However, since those two rocky outings, Rodon has regained his groove in his last five starts: 31 1/3 innings pitched, five earned runs allowed, just two walks, and 41 strikeouts. That’s elite pitching, close to a 1.50 ERA.
Teams were not willing to trade a lot of chips to the Giants for Rodon at the deadline. Those teams might be regretting their unwillingness to go all-in.
Courtesy of FanDuelhere are the Padres-Giants MLB odds.
MLB Odds: Padres-Giants Odds
San Diego Padres: +1.5 (-200)
San Francisco Giants: -1.5 (+164)
Over: 7.5 (-102)
Under: 7.5 (-120)
Why The Padres Could Cover The Spread
The wheels have come off for the Giants. San Francisco won five games in a row from Aug. 12-16. The Giants were 59-57, just 4.5 games out of the third National League wild card spot. They had a real chance to return to the postseason and put the first four months of the season behind them. They have since lost eight of 10 and four in a row. They just got swept in Minnesota by the Twins on a weekend when their pitching deserted them and they blew a late lead on Saturday night. At 61-65, they’re pretty much done, a team wondering how it could be so dominant in 2021 and then so bad the next.
Sure, injuries have really hurt the Giants this year. There’s no doubt about that. However, even with injuries, a team declining by 30 games — as the Giants are in the process of doing — is still jawdropping. For perspective, if the Giants were 20 games worse than 2021, they’d be right in the thick of the playoff hunt, but a 30-game drop puts them well out. San Diego can pounce on this team on Monday night.
Why The Giants Could Cover the Spread
The Padres did win their weekend series against the Royals, but their pitching was still hammered. The Padres’ offense finally woke up, but San Diego won two of three from a bad team. Overall, the Padres have not gotten better since the trades for Juan Soto, Brandon Drury, Josh Bell, and Josh Hader. They are treading water. Carlos Rodon is the better pitcher in this game. The pitching matchup favors San Francisco.
Final Padres-Giants Prediction & Pick
The Padres are the better team, but Carlos Rodon is the better pitcher. The Giants, who have been terrible, are bound to play better. Taking the Giants at a big plus price is an opportunity worth taking.
Final Padres-Giants Prediction & Pick: Giants -1.5
