baseball | Tuesday, June 13, 2023 9:56 AM

Minnesota Twins vs Milwaukee Brewers Best Bet: Back The Under On Tuesday Night

Sam Cox

Minnesota Twins vs Milwaukee Brewers Best Bet: Tuesday, June 13th

The Minnesota Twins and Milwaukee Brewers matchup on Tuesday night. These teams might be competing for their respective divisions, but they are both hovering around .500, with a lone game separating them in the loss column.

Milwaukee suffered a humiliating sweep at the hands of the Oakland Athletics at the weekend. That took them to four losses in a row and provokes serious questions about the direction of this team as the trade deadline nears. Minnesota hasn’t fared much better of late, going 2-6 over their last eight. They are very fortunate the American League Central is so weak.

These teams might not exactly be box office right now, but Tuesday provides a tantalising pitching matchup between former Cy Young winner Corbin Burnes and Minnesota’s headline offseason acquisition Pablo Lopez.

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Minnesota Twins vs Milwaukee Brewers Preview
Minnesota Twins vs Milwaukee Brewers Best Bet

Minnesota Twins vs Milwaukee Brewers Preview

Wed, Jun 14. 00:40 (UK time)

Lopez’s 4.25 ERA doesn’t seem like anything to write home about. The former Marlin, though, has been unfortunate and owns some glittering underlying metrics. His xERA is 3.36. Lopez is forcing hitters to chase, while not allowing too much hard contact. He pitched seven innings of one-run ball against the high-powered Tampa Bay Rays last time out.

Burnes had a poor start to the year, but he has looked much more like his dominant self over the last six weeks, racking up the strikeouts and conceding very little hard contact. His ERA has dropped to 3.36, which almost matches his expected figure. The strikeouts still aren’t quite at the level they have been previously, yet his other metrics are very similar to what we have come to expect from Milwaukee’s ace.

So, we have two excellent pitchers going head-to-head in this series opener. Burnes and Lopez have shut down plenty of line ups already this season. They have a chance to do so again on Tuesday.

Since the start of May, Milwaukee is tied with the Cubs for the worst offence in the big leagues by wRC+. Minnesota is also at 97 wRC+, which indicates they are below the league average.
Minnesota has the worst contact rate in the Majors, which doesn’t bode well against Burnes. Milwaukee is also in the bottom 10 in that metric.

Minnesota Twins vs Milwaukee Brewers Best Bet

Both of these teams have seen the under land in 57.1% of their games. Sure, this line is a bit lower than normal, but that’s reasonable with the starters we have going in this matchup. Only three teams have hit the under more often than these two.

Two average bullpens are the biggest threat to backing the under here. We have a pair of great starters, though, and two struggling offences. Neither relief corps should have to do too much with Lopez and Burnes both capable of getting deep into this one.