Brendan O’Sullivan dives into his pick and prediction for the New York Yankees vs. Kansas City Royals game on Saturday, April 18.
The Yankees and Royals play the second game of their three-game series on Saturday, April 18.
New York is a -168 moneyline favorite, while Kansas City is +139 on DraftKings Sportsbook. The game total is set at over/under eight runs.
Let’s get into a pick and prediction for this Yankees vs. Royals game.
Yankees vs. Royals prediction, preview
The Yankees started the season 7-1. Now they’re 11-9. Yikes. The roster is still dealing with injuries, but many losses are still inexcusable for a team with World Series aspirations. Luckily for them, this series started off on the right foot.
New York defeated Kansas City 4-2 on Friday. Cam Schlittler pitched six innings, allowing three hits and one unearned run while striking out six. If the Yankees could have him on the mound every day, their record would be much better. Bad news … that’s not possible.
Will Warren will start the game on Saturday, which isn’t the worst. The right-hander has a 2.46 ERA across four starts, but he’s not pitching deep into games. His longest start is 5.2 innings with his other three being 3.2, 4.1 and 4.2. Reaching the sixth inning without major damage will be the goal on Saturday.
Noah Cameron gets the start for the struggling Royals. He has a 3.94 ERA which isn’t terrible, but it’s also not great. His last start was messy: 5.1 innings, five earned runs, six hits, two walks and four strikeouts. The two starts prior went 5.2 and 5.0 innings with one earned run apiece.
Which version of Cameron that arrives at Yankee Stadium will be a major factor. If he quiets the New York offense, it’ll put even more pressure on Warren and the bullpen to do the same.
Yankees vs. Royals Pick, Best Bet
If Warren could go deeper into the game, this would be an easy decision. His early exits make for heavy bullpen usage, which could be difficult after the Yankees used three relievers on Friday.
Although Warren’s starts are short, he’s typically reliable. Additionally, the bullpen doesn’t have a major challenge as Kansas City averages the second fewest runs per game. It’ll likely be another low-scoring game for the Royals.
Best Bet: Under eight runs (-105)
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source dknetwork.draftkings.com ’
