Caleb Wilfinger
The 2025 MLB postseason continues on Thursday with a trio of series-deciding games in the Wild Card round. It’s Tigers vs Guardians, Padres vs Cubs and Red Sox vs Yankees for a chance to advance to the ALDS and NLDS. The Pickswise team is on a 49-31 run in this MLB best bets series, and I went 2-0 in yesterday’s best bets column. Let’s build on that momentum and hopefully deliver some more winners today! Make sure you also check out our MLB picks for every Wild Card game on Thursday, October 2 and throughout the entire MLB postseason.
MLB best bet: Detroit Tigers vs Cleveland Guardians Under 7 (-110)
Odds available at FanDuel Sportsbook at time of publishing. Playable to -120.
As I mentioned in Wednesday’s best bets piece, MLB Wild Card round games have traditionally been lower-scoring affairs since the start of the new postseason format back in 2022. In fact, the Under is now 20-6-3 in the Wild Card and that historical trend continued this year, as 5 of the 8 games played went Under the total, with another game settling exactly on the number. We have a pretty decent sample size at this point to suggest that pitching tends to dominate the proceedings in these games, and we should see another instance of the arms winning out in an elimination game between a pair of struggling offenses.
The Tigers are having a miserable time at the plate through the first 2 games of this series, as Detroit has managed just 3 runs over its first 18 innings. Cleveland hasn’t been much better, with the Guardians registering just 2 runs of their own over the first 16 innings of the series, before finally breaking Game 2 open with a 5-run 8th inning to force a deciding Game 3. I don’t anticipate that changing on Thursday, as Slade Cecconi (2.25 ERA vs Detroit) and Jack Flaherty (2.51 career ERA vs Cleveland) should both hold advantages on these pretty pedestrian lineups that both pitchers and bullpens should be very familiar with.
Speaking of bullpens, both teams should turn to their respective bullpens early and look to play the matchups down the stretch in order to neutralize the matchups that the opposing managers want to exploit at the plate. With that in mind, I’m projecting another slow day at the plate for both sides. Let’s take another Under in this AL Central showdown.
Read our full Tigers vs Guardians prediction for today’s MLB Wild Card Game 3
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