Caleb Wilfinger
The 2025 MLB season resumes following the all-star break, and Friday features a full slate of action for us to enjoy. I’m 49-30 on my MLB best bets this year and the Pickswise MLB handicapping team as a whole is 100-65-6 in this article series this season, including being on a 22-7 run right now. Let’s keep it going as we get into today’s top picks on Friday, July 18. You can also find out our MLB picks for EVERY GAME today.
MLB best bet: Seattle Mariners ML over Houston Astros (-130)
Odds available at FanDuel Sportsbook at time of publishing. Playable to -140.
For my first MLB best bet for today, we’ll focus on an AL West matchup between the Houston Astros and Seattle Mariners. This is a pivotal battle among the top 2 teams in the division, and Seattle is in prime position to pick up a crucial victory at home to open this series. For starters, Houston is really banged up, particularly on offense, where the Astros will be without Yordan Alvarez, Jeremy Pena and Jake Meyers, who was playing great prior to suffering an injury earlier this month. Now, they’ll be going up against Luis Castillo, who has surrendered just 4 runs over his last 18 innings pitched.
As for Seattle, the Mariners’ offense is ranked 7th in OPS and SLG, and the team continues to ride the wave of this miraculous season they’re getting from Cal Raleigh. The offense should continue to roll against Astros starter Brandon Walker, who has surrendered a whopping 12 earned runs over his last 11 innings pitched away from home. Seattle is one of the top teams in the American League against left-handed pitching, so let’s look for that trend to continue against a fairly unproven starter and the banged-up Houston bullpen at T-Mobile Park on Friday.
Read our full Astros vs Mariners prediction for tonight
MLB best bet: St. Cardinals vs Arizona Diamondbacks Over 8.5 (-120)
Odds available at Fanatics Sportsbook at time of publishing. Playable to -130.
Our 2nd MLB best bet today takes us to Arizona, where the Diamondbacks are hosting the St. Louis Cardinals in a series that holds real weight for both teams in the NL Wild Card race. The Cardinals have overachieved a bit to this point, but Andre Pallante is not a pitcher who inspires a ton of confidence on the mound (4.49 ERA, bottom 20% expected batting average, bottom 5% strikeout rate). He’ll be going up against one of the best offenses in baseball on the road, which is not a combination that bodes well for a struggling pitcher on Friday.
As for the hosts, Arizona is countering with Brandon Pfaadt, who is in the bottom 1% of all qualified starters in xERA (6.20) and expected batting average (.306), to go along with an abysmal 49.7% hard-hit rate and 13.1% barrel rate, both of which rank in the bottom 3% per Baseball Savant. While the Cardinals’ offense has been inconsistent all year long (14th in OPS, 18th in SLG), Pfaadt hasn’t registered many quality starts on the season, and I wouldn’t expect that to start now. The Diamondbacks’ bullpen has also been a real issue (4.94 ERA), so there’s always the threat of that continuing in a big spot as well. Let’s back the Over in the desert.
Celebrate the return of baseball in style with our MLB parlay picks at +887 odds!
