Guardians vs Yankees ALCS Game 1 Prop Bets: Soto Leads Offensive Charge

Prop bet #1: Alex Cobb Over 3.5 hits allowed

-131 at Caesars

Alex Cobb has lost his way over the last two seasons, failing to pitch well to contact on the ground last season with a .278 xBA and following that up with a bad .280 xBA in three starts amidst an injury-shortened 2024 season.

He’s yielded a lifetime .275 xBA to this lineup in his career and has posted a .286 mark at Yankee Stadium. Now, he’ll meet an even stronger version of the New York Yankees, who hit .280 against ground-ball pitchers this season to finish third in the league.

Yes, the Yankees are hitting just .220 during the playoffs, but they rank first with a blistering 49.5% hard-hit rate and second to just the Dodgers with a .280 xBA in four games.

We saw a bit of positive regression to the mean in Game 4 of the ALDS when the Yankees racked up eight hits, and things should continue to trend up in a dream matchup against Cobb. The nice part of this, too, is that while this team has walked at an insane 17.3% clip this postseason, Cobb’s pitched to a brilliant 6.5% walk rate in his career.

New York should be swinging the bats early and often, and with the damage those bats are doing on contact, coupled with Cobb’s brutal expected numbers, the hit column should populate quickly.

Prop bet #2: Juan Soto 2+ total bases

+135 at DraftKings

I’m a bit shocked to see Juan Soto’s total bases priced like this, even if he’s managed just one hit over his last three games with three walks.

As we covered above, we can’t expect Cobb to walk too many here with his long track record of throwing strikes, and that should mean that Soto swings the bat here — something his bettors have been waiting to see this postseason.

Soto owns an excellent .412 xBA and .854 xSLG in 12 career plate appearances against Cobb with just one walk, and he was New York’s top hitter against ground-ball pitchers this year, hitting .416 with a whopping 63 total bases in 89 at-bats.

There’s no better bat to put your money behind on Monday.

Prop bet #3: Carlos Rodon Over 5.5 strikeouts

+124 at FanDuel

If Tarik Skubal can do it, so can Carlos Rodon.

Yes, this Cleveland Guardians team has made a name for itself by making plenty of contact over the past two seasons. Still, they’ve watched their punchout rate swell to 22.8% this postseason and twice allowed Skubal to rack up 6+ strikeouts over the course of their four-game series against the Tigers.

Reese Olson was only asked to work four innings in his Game 3 start but managed four Ks, and Game 2 was started by an opener in Keider Montero.

Rodon finished the season with a 30.1% strikeout rate in September, backed by a stellar whiff rate near 35%, and victimized the Royals last week with seven strikeouts over just 3 2/3 innings.

The Guardians own the second-worst OPS in baseball to power pitchers like Rodon, and with a terrible .218 xBA this postseason, they should struggle against the lefty.

Even if Rodon goes just five innings, he should find a way home on six punchouts with his sweltering strikeout numbers and a matchup with Cleveland, who has fallen victim to an unseasonably high punchout rate in the playoffs.