The Pittsburgh Pirates (64-73) and Chicago Cubs (71-67) play the second game of their three-game series on Tuesday night at Wrigley Field. First pitch is set for 7:40 p.m. ET on Marquee Sports Network and SportsNet Pittsburgh.
These National League Central rivals face off for the second-to-last time this season, as the Cubs continue to run hot and chase a potential wild card bid.
Chicago sits just three-and-a-half games out of the final wild card spot in the National League. It's won 24-of-40 games since the All-Star break and nine of their last 11.
Pittsburgh won the series opener behind the late-inning heroics of Bryan Reynolds and Andrew McCutchen, who each hit a home run in the eighth for Pirates. It was one of the few bullpen implosions for the Cubs, who have had one of the best relief ERAs in baseball for the last month of play.
For the Cubs to bounce back from yesterday's loss and continue this torrid stretch, they'll need to go through rookie phenom, Paul Skenes. In his 18 starts this year, the 22-year-old has only taken two losses, and the Pirates are 11-7 when he starts.
Let's see how this one is projected to play out and where we can find an edge in the odds, including my Pittsburgh Pirates vs. Chicago Cubs prediction and pick.
Pirates vs Cubs Prediction
- Pirates vs Cubs Pick: Pirates F5 ML (-142 | Play to -160)
My Pirates-Cubs best bet is on Pirates F5 innings ML, where I see value at -142. The best line is available at FanDuel, as well as other sportsbooks — make sure to find the best odds by checking our live MLB odds page.
Pirates vs Cubs Odds
| Pirates Odds | ||
|---|---|---|
| Moneyline | Total | Run Line |
-126 | 7.5 +102 / -124 | -1.5 +140 |
| Cubs Odds | ||
|---|---|---|
| Moneyline | Total | Run Line |
+108 | 7.5 +102 / -124 | +1.5 -170 |
Pirates vs Cubs Projected Starting Pitchers
| RHP Paul Skenes (PIT) | Stat | LHP Kyle Hendricks (CHC) |
|---|---|---|
| 8-2 | W-L | 3-10 |
| 3.2 | fWAR (FanGraphs) | -0.1 |
| 2.23 / 2.67 | ERA /xERA | 6.75 /5.22 |
| 2.73 / 2.69 | FIP / xFIP | 5.39 / 4.56 |
| 0.95 | WHIP | 1.53 |
| 26.1% | K-BB% | 8.2% |
| 49.6% | GB% | 44.4% |
| 104 | Stuff+ | 95 |
| 103 | Location+ | 105 |
Justin Perri’s Pirates vs Cubs Preview
Pittsburgh Pirates Betting Preview: Trust Skenes to Deliver
There have been concerns about Skenes all season long, but he's proved each and every one of them wrong in hist first season. The worries about his velocity are behind him as he sat at 98.6 and 98.7 mph on the fastball in his last two starts.
He's only allowed four earned runs in his last 17 innings and has struck out 21 batters in that span. His most recent start was also against today's opponent, the Chicago Cubs, a rival that he'll see often in his career with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
In the first meeting between these two last Wednesday, the rookie hurler tossed five innings of three-run ball (two earned) and ultimately took a "no decision" in a game that ended in a 14-10 Cubs win.
Skenes really didn't have his best stuff on display last week; he made four clear mistakes with his fastball and paid for it.
There's been a high correlation between Skenes limiting fastball mistakes and having dominant outings. That checks out, because even when the fastball isn't the best, he's able to use his strong sinker to keep his ground-ball rate favorably high. But when he can mix the two effectively and then add in the curveball, slider and changeup to get outs, he becomes dominant.
The pricing on Skenes is favorable today on the road, and he's having a bit of a tougher second half compared to what he did early in the season.
That opens the door to trust his stuff for a better price.
The recent struggles he's seen can be as easily attributed to bad luck as the hot start can be to good luck. Underneath it is high quality pitching that makes him a bonafide ace quality arm you want to trust.
The velocity looks good, and he should have a better result against the Cubs today.
Chicago Cubs Betting Preview: Wild Card Run Really Happ-ening
In the last 30 days, the Cubs have four of the top 26 players in the National League by wRC+, including the fourth-rated NL player in that span, Ian Happ. Happ is slashing .309/.391/.608 since August 4 and has accumulated 17 RBI and 19 runs in just 24 games.
Alongside the red-hot outfielder, the Cubs are also currently getting major contributions from Pete Crow-Armstrong, who's looked like a new player in the last few weeks, as well as Seiya Suzuki and Dansby Swanson.
They've parlayed the surge in batting with one of the best bullpen performances over the last month, behind names like Porter Hodge, Jorge Lopez, Tyson Miller and Nate Pearson. The group has combined to pitch 45 innings while just allowing 11 earned runs with 61 strikeouts.
It's worth noting that four of those 11 runs occurred yesterday. They've been nothing short of dominant, and when the starters leave this game, the Cubs will have the advantage.
Unfortunately, they won't have the advantage when Kyle Hendricks is pitching. This was supposed to be a marquee matchup between Justin Steele and Paul Skenes, but Steele was scratched with elbow inflammation.
Hendricks brings a lot less to the table, and the Pirates beat him up for six runs in less than two innings last week. He has only had one start without surrendering at least two runs since the start of July, and even if you remove the terrible outing against the Pirates, he still had a 4.54 ERA with a 1.31 WHIP with a weak 4.99 PLV in the eight games prior.
The Cubs do play a bit better at home; they're 36-30 in games at Wrigley this year. Plus, with the offense clicking, Chicago has seen a run of 8-1-1 O/U in its last 10 games.
Pirates vs Cubs Prediction, Betting Analysis
Analyzing the betting market for a baseball game with a pitching change is always a bit difficult.
The Cubs opened as -140 favorites when Steele was presumed to be pitching. That's now flipped to +105 underdogs with Hendricks stepping in. Clearly the market thinks Hendricks is a less secure option.
There's been a bit of buy back, as the price did climb to Cubs +115 at some spots overnight.
The pitching change also altered the total, sending it from 6.5 to 7.5 with Hendricks expected to surrender a higher median run value. It appears to still be climbing, and that's likely the sharper side.
My pick for this one is going to be on Skenes, who I think is pitching better than the market does, and fading Hendricks, who should give us ample opportunity to get a first-half win.
I don't want to involve bullpens, as the Cubs should have the advantage there. The market agrees with that, charging around 20-25 cents more on the F5 than for the full game when betting the Pirates.
I think the price difference should be higher, and I expect a dominant performance from Skenes.
If you remember, the last time these foes met was the game in which Crow-Armstrong went 4-for-4 with four singles. That's pretty tough to have happen again, and much of the contact against Skenes in that one could have gone for outs.
In fact there was no solid contact and no barrels by the Cubs in their first meeting with Skenes at all, only flares, burners and poor contact.
I think the underlaying process points to value behind one of baseball's most impressive talents.
Pick: Pirates F5 ML -142 (Play to -160)
Moneyline
The Cubs have won nine of their last 11 games while the Pirates have lost six of their last 10 games. The Pirates have done well as the favorite, winning 28-of-52 games when Vegas expects them to win.
The main storyline with the game result on Tuesday is the Cubs trying to gain ground on the wild card race. There are only 24 games remaining for Chicago to make up a 3.5-game deficit and jump over both the Braves and the Mets.
Expect the Pirates to play spoiler against their division foes, even with their season over.
Run Line (Spread)
Only one of the last five meetings between these teams was decided by just one run, which likely removes most of the value on the +1.5 run line today and places it more firmly on Cubs moneyline — if you want to play on Chicago.
If the Pirates are likely to win, it'll come at the expense of Hendricks, who's prone to giving up multiple runs.
They also would need a strong bullpen performance, so they're more likely to win by multiple runs here behind Skenes.
If all of that goes awry, the value will be on Chicago to walk away with a victory, as things can certainly get ugly for the Pittsburgh bullpen, and even Skenes, from time to time.
Over/Under
The over has been climbing ever since the news about Steele getting scratched broke. That's pretty fair, as Hendricks certainly opens the door to more runs being scored early.
However, I think there's real merit to the over today, even if you're late to the party. The 7.5 number has plus-money lines available to go over, and with how the Pirates' bullpen has looked — and the potential for Hendricks to give up three by himself — there should be a good shot for some runs.
Pirates vs Cubs Betting Trends
- 60% of the bets and 19% of the money are on the Pirates on the moneyline.
- 70% of the bets and 87% of the money are on the over.
- 72% of the bets and 61% of the money are on the Pirates to cover the run line.
