My family and I didn’t have to eat ice chips for dinner last night … THANK GOD! We binked our two afternoon YRFI/NRFI bets yesterday to cash a +220 parlay and went 1-1 on our late-game picks. A nice 3-1 bounce-back!
Today’s MLB slate is small, but we’ve still got some games I see a YRFI in and a NRFI at just insane value. Let’s stay hot off that 3-1 Wednesday and start smashing some of these no run first inning bets.
Best YRFI & NRFI Bets Today: Yes & No Run First Inning Bets
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St. Louis Cardinals vs. Atlanta Braves First Inning Bet
The yes run first inning bets have cashed in each of the first two games of this series, and I don’t see that trend stopping tonight — especially with the corpse that is Adam Wainwright on the mound for the Cardinals.
Let’s start with Max Fried, though. Straight up, the dude’s been an absolute ace on no run first innings. He’s 10-1 this season and is riding a 3-1 NRFI streak. However, the Cardinals proved they can still dial it up against even the best arms, plating four against Spencer Strider in the first inning last night. Yes, this Cardinals team is vastly underperforming in terms of wins and losses, but they’re still scoring just over 4.5 runs per game and are a top-12 first-inning offense.
Wainwright somehow spun a one-run gem against the Padres his last time out, but all I see on his stat sheet is ONE strikeout. Look at his four games, and you can tally up — wait for it — SIX strikeouts. This man is not missing bats. Like, at all. This is a recipe for disaster against a Braves offense that might score 27 runs in the first inning against him. Wainwright is 10-8 on NRFIs this year, and we’re about to make it 10-9.
Best YRFI Pick Today: Cardinals-Braves for -140 at Caesars
Detroit Tigers vs. New York Yankees First Inning Bet
This is the value I was salivating over. This Tigers-Yankees no run first inning bet is only at -105 at DraftKings right now, and I can’t figure out why. Should that scare me? Maybe. But right now, I ain’t blinkin’ at it.
The struggles of the Tigers offense have been well documented, ranking second-to-last in runs per game (3.94) and 21st in runs scored per first inning. A lot of the “good” Tigers bats are left-handed (outside of Spencer Torkelson), so we get the platoon split in our favor with the Yankees sending Carlos Rodon to the mound. Rodon is 7-2 in no run first inning chances this season and has 24 strikeouts against Tigers batters in 55 career at-bats.
Now, we’ll need Eduardo Rodriguez to get us the final three outs here. He’s been extremely strong in the first inning this season, cashing NRFIs 17 times (17-4 NRFI record). The first two games of this series have gone toward the YRFI, but I think Rodriguez will close it out for us as long as he can navigate his way around Aaron Judge.
Best NRFI Bet Today: Tigers-Yankees for -105 at DraftKings
Thursday’s YRFI/NRFI Parlay
We’ve got some great individual value on these bets, but where can we parlay them together to get the best odds?
DraftKings Sportsbook looks to be offering the best odds on our yes/no run first inning parlay today. Combining both picks there gets us to +221 odds.
