I am very excited and thankful to be back with Pickswise for my 3rd season of player prop articles. I look forward to sharing my MLB thoughts and bets with you each Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday for the next 7 months!
Patrick Corbin (WAS) over 5.5 hits allowed (+110)
Patrick Corbin has been one of my favorite pitchers to bet against in the past few seasons. With his season debut coming on the road in such a hitter-friendly park, I see no reason to ignore this price on a prop I like. The left-handed starter has posted an xERA of 5.62 or higher in each of the last 3 campaigns while seeing sharp decline in his strikeout numbers. His 210 hits (1.26 H/IP) allowed in the past two years have been accompanied by an xBA over .300, ranking him in just the 1st percentile.
He tends to fill the zone with just a 7.2% BB% last season, and with his relatively high per-start pitch count of 91.3 the left-hander allowed 6 or more hits in 21 of his 32 starts. His final spring training start saw 86 pitches after 74 in the previous outing. Corbin's 2023 debut spanned only 3 innings of work, but he tossed 85 pitches with 7 hits allowed. I expect around 85-95 pitches in this outing depending on performance. Corbin has added a cutter in the offseason but still allowed 13 hits and 6 earned runs in 7.2 innings during those final 2 outings. Spring training numbers can be deceiving, especially with veterans who are testing new things out, but I am not here to talk myself out of a Patrick Corbin fade.'