Welcome to Opening Pitch, our daily baseball betting column that features our MLB predictions and expert picks for Saturday, April 18.
The goal for Opening Pitch is to highlight top daily projection edges for MLB moneylines and totals, share our favorite bets and props, and provide some betting notes and analysis.
New development: each Saturday, Action Network Rookie reliever Matt Trollo will fill in for Sean Zerillo. Exciting!
Still, as always, Zerillo's projections for every MLB game on Saturday are available in the Action App (on both the PRO Projections tab and the game pages) and our Projections Hub. You can also shop for the best lines on our MLB Odds page.
Here are Trollo's MLB predictions and picks for Saturday.
MLB Predictions, Picks for Saturday, April 18
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- Twins (F5) – 140, 0.7u (Play to -150)
- Astros o4.5 Team Runs (-104), 1.04u (Play to -140, reduce to 0.5u above -120)
Reds vs Twins Picks
Last season, Andrew Abbott posted a career best 2.87 ERA and without a single estimator below three and a half (3.55 xERA), nobody could figure out how he’d done it.
So far this season, its’ swung back entirely in the opposite direction. While his 4.61 xFIP is merely 0.3 runs above last year, Abbott’s ERA has more than doubled (5.85).
To be clear, I was cherry picking with the xFIP. His remaining indicators are all far worse than last season, including the pitch modeling (4.67 Bot ERA, 90 Pitching+).
Counter to Abbott, Taj Bradley may have finally figured it out. It’s uncommon for a pitcher to improve after leaving the Rays, but the Twins have a track record of getting the most out of Tampa Bay pitching acquisitions (see Ryan, Joe).
Bradley has nearly doubled last year’s K-BB rate (11.7% to 22.6%), while the key improvements appear to be in his fastball (up 0.5 mph, 52 to 57 PitchingBot overall grade, 102 to 110 Pitching+) and splitter (40 to 49, 87 to 106).
The heater is getting 0.7 inches more iVB (18.5 to 19.2), which on it’s own makes the splitter more difficult to negotiate, as the latter has gone from an 11.9 SwStr% to 20.9%.
With command/location grades remaining the same, the Twins appear to have unlocked another level in Bradley’s pure stuff.
With an 11.4 SwStr% and 15.7 CStr%, there are warning signs he may not sustain the new 31.2 K%, but these are clearly two pitchers trending in opposite directions.
We can also expect the Twins to put a better offensive product on the field than the Reds. Saturday’s projected Minnesota lineup (Rotowire & MLBstartingnine.com) holds a 10 point wRC+ edge over Cinncinnati’s vs L/RHP since last season, while the teams are separated by 30 points of wRC+ for the 2026 season. The Twins are also 38 points better at home than the Reds have been on the road this year.
Small samples, but with large enough disparities that there’s probably some thing to them and it’s not like the Reds were a feared lineup in 2025 either.
The Reds do have a defensive edge and a small base running one, making this a smaller edge and I don’t want to get into a battle of two poor bullpens, where Minnesota has been the worse of the two so far.
Some books don’t have a live F5 line at the time of this writing, so it’s possible an even better number could turn up.
Pick: Twins (F5) -140, 0.7u (Play to -150)
Cardinals vs Astros Picks
Andre Pallante averaged estimators around four and a half, much lower than his 5.31 ERA last year, due to a 62.2 LOB%.
Still, with just a 6.9 K-BB%, it was his ability to generate ground balls (59.1%) and limit hard contact (39.9%), especially in the air (6.5% Barrels/BBE) that left him even marginally useful, though certainly a below average pitcher.
Pallante actually has a better ERA (4.80), while his peripherals have completely cratered in three starts this year.
First, he’s failed to strike out more batters than he’s walked in any of his three starts (-1.4 K-BB%). The ground ball rate is down to 49.1%, but that’s more of a one game fluke (31.8%) against the Red Sox. However, he’s also been above a 40% hard hit rate in each of his three starts.
While Pitching Bot thinks he’s essentially the same guy (4.99 Bot ERA to 4.80), Location+ points to his cratering with a 10 point drop (101 – 91), resulting in a 13 point drop in his Pitching+ (98 – 85).
The Houston offense is off to a hot start (123 wRC+ vs RHP), especially at home (126 wRC+). Over a larger sample, the projected lineup has a 107 wRC+ against RHP since last season.
If a predominantly right-handed lineup for Houston is a concern, batters from either side of the plate are between a .321 and .343 wOBA and xwOBA against Pallante since the start of the 2025 season.
It’s true the Cardinals have one of the better defenses in the league (projected lineup 20 Fielding Run Value), but the bullpen has been atrocious (5.30 FIP/4.82 xFIP/4.52 SIERA).
It’s only projected to be in the 70s in Houston on Saturday, but the threat of rain should keep the roof closed (as it almost always is), giving us a perfectly neutral run environment (100 Park Run Factor via Statcast). Willie Traynor is similarly neutral behind the plate most times.
Even without Pallante’s further decline this season, I would expect the Astros to exceed their 4.5 team run total and we’re getting a great price as of this writing at -104.
I also project the Astros to win this game, but only as often as the market suggests and I’d rather avoid a highly volatile Lance McCullers Jr. and Houston bullpen that’s been even worse than St Louis.
Pick: Astros o4.5 Team Runs -104, 1.04u (Play to -140, reduce to 0.5u above -120)
Matt Trollo's MLB Picks and Predictions for Saturday, April 18
Follow me in the Action Network App for additional bet notifications.
- Twins (F5) – 140, 0.7u (Play to -150)
- Astros o4.5 Team Runs (-104), 1.04u (Play to -140, reduce to 0.5u above -120)
