Major League Baseball

2023 MLB odds: Four MLB best bets to make now

Published Mar. 29, 2023 4:00 p.m. ET

The best part about a brand-new MLB season is hope.

Hope that your favorite team will make the playoffs and pop champagne. Hope that the stud prospect lives up to all the hype and then some. Hope that your biggest rivals suffer a crushing loss in the season’s final week.

In my world, there’s hope that we’ll be in a great position to make some money as the season winds down. I feel great about a handful of wagers for 2023, and you already know I’m ready to share my pick to win it all.

Here are my favorite baseball bets for this season.

San Diego Padres Over 93.5 wins: -105 (bet $10 to win $19.52 total)
Padres to win World Series: +900 (bet $10 to win $100 total)

This is the year it comes together in Slam Diego.

The Padres are absolutely loaded with talent, and I think it’s clear they’ve closed the gap with the big, bad Los Angeles Dodgers. Yu Darvish, Joe Musgrove and Blake Snell headline a strong rotation, and that lineup is as deep as any in baseball at full strength.

San Diego Padres Season Preview: Can they overtake the Los Angeles Dodgers as King

Ben Verlander and Alex Curry bring you everything you need to know about the San Diego Padres heading into the season.

Over the last eight months, the Padres front office has successfully flanked Manny Machado, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Jake Cronenworth with two all-world players in Juan Soto and Xander Bogaerts. Add in savvy, veteran hitters like Matt Carpenter and Nelson Cruz, and you’ve got a scary group.

It’s also a positive that the Dodgers and Padres will likely pace each other in pursuit of an NL West title. Both teams should be favored 120 times or more in the regular season, and competition tends to bring out the best.

I can make a case for about nine teams to win the World Series, but I’m a sucker for San Diego’s all-around talent. I envision All-Star closer Josh Hader slamming the door on Houston in the Fall Classic.

Chicago White Sox Season Preview: Can they bounce back from last year's disaster

Ben Verlander and Alex Curry bring you everything you need to know about the Chicago White Sox heading into the season.

Chicago White Sox win AL Central: +300 (bet $10 to win $40 total)

The talent is all there on the South Side, but marquee players need to stay on the field and actualize their potential. Here’s looking at you, Luis Robert.

This is a wide-open division with Chicago, Cleveland and Minnesota all separated by three games in terms of regular-season win totals. But let’s remember that the White Sox were as high as -600 to make the playoffs last year and -200 or higher to win the division. Hmmm.

Buying the dip at 3-1 isn’t the worst idea.

You have to imagine the clubhouse will be a lot different this year with a manager [Pedro Grifol] that was born after World War II. Spare me with your analytics about how managers aren’t a big deal. Tony La Russa was asleep at the wheel and asleep in the dugout. It was time for a change.

Last year was frustrating, but last year is over.

Oakland Athletics Season Preview: Who will be the bright spot this year

Ben Verlander and Alex Curry bring you everything you need to know about the Oakland Athletics heading into the season.

Oakland Athletics Under 59.5 wins: -105 (bet $10 to win $19.52 total)

Veteran Las Vegas bookmaker Chris Andrews told me many years ago that high totals are high for a reason, and low totals are low for a reason. And they don’t come much lower than 59.5 in a Major League Baseball season.

After winning the AL West in the COVID-shortened 2020 campaign, the Athletics have moved almost every player with a pulse. Chris Bassitt, Sean Manaea, Frankie Montas, Liam Hendriks, Sean Murphy, Matt Olson, Marcus Semien and Matt Chapman are all long gone, and the A’s are in a full-fledged rebuild at this point in time.

"They might be favored in 30 games," one oddsmaker told FOX Sports.

It’s very clear Oakland isn’t trying to win, and I’m sure you’ve heard the rumblings about the team potentially moving to Las Vegas, too. It sort of feels like the plot to Major League when Rachel Phelps wanted to move the team to Miami – only there’s no storybook ending around this club.

You should also consider that once Oakland is buried in the deck by June, it’ll start flipping any players that are exceeding expectations.

This could get ugly.

Sam Panayotovich is a sports betting analyst for FOX Sports and NESN. He previously worked for WGN Radio, NBC Sports and VSiN. He'll probably pick against your favorite team. Follow him on Twitter @spshoot.

Top Gambling Stories

Download the FOX Super 6 app for your chance to win thousands of dollars on the biggest sporting events each and every week! Just make your picks and you could win the grand prize. Download and play today!