MLB picks, Open golf predictions & Women's World Cup best bets for Thursday

Good morning, Pickswise Nation! It’s another action-packed day of sports and today we have a solid MLB slate plus the first round of the Open Championship golf and the start of the Women’s World Cup in soccer, so let’s get straight to making your next bet better.

About Last Night

Angels complete sweep of Yankees
After Tuesday’s wild scoring spree across the diamonds of America, things calmed down a little on Wednesday and the highest score was 8 runs, achieved by the Orioles in an 8-5 win over the Dodgers and the Cubs, who beat the Nationals 8-3. The Rangers won their 6th straight game, beating the Rays 5-1, while the Angels completed a sweep of the Yankees with a 7-3 victory. We went 2-0 with our MLB player prop picks and also 2-0 with our YRFI/NRFI Best Bets, putting Caleb Wilfinger on a 16-5 run with his first-inning picks!

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Today’s Slate

10-Game MLB slate
Today’s MLB slate provides plenty of early action with 7 afternoon Games including the Diamondbacks looking to complete a surprising sweep of the Braves at 12:20 pm ET. Check out all of today’s MLB picks.

Golf on both sides of the Atlantic
The Open Championship first round is underway this morning at Royal Liverpool GC in England, and our Golf expert Diane Knox Balas also has Golf predictions for the Barracuda Championship, which is unusual in that it uses modified Stableford scoring. If a Golfer pops up on the Open leaderboard that you don’t know much about, remember we have profiles of every player in the field in our Open player guide that will be useful for your in-play betting.

Best Bet of the Day

MLB: San Diego Padres vs Toronto Blue Jays Under 9 runs
1:07 pm ET, MLB Network

Blake Snell has turned himself into a legitimate candidate for the NL Cy Young award and has turned a corner since Gary Sanchez became his catcher 9 starts ago. Since then, Snell has a 0.51 ERA in 53 innings and has limited hitters to a .150 batting average, .243 on-base percentage, .194 slugging percentage and .437 OPS. Snell’s strikeout rate before Sanchez was 27.9%, but with Sanchez, it has skyrocketed to 46.1%. With a 4.12 ERA and a 1.23 WHIP, Chris Bassitt’s stats don’t stand out. However, in Toronto, Bassitt is 5-1 with a 2.47 ERA and a 0.874 WHIP along with limiting hitters to a .165 batting average, .259 on-base percentage and .499 OPS. That’s quite different from his 5.71 ERA and .304 opponent batting average on the road. This series opener should finish far below the high total of 9 runs. Check out our full Padres vs Blue Jays predictions.

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Must-read

You can read our MLB mega parlay and YRFI/NRFI Best Bets for today’s baseball and Keith Schmelter has also supplied his expert MLB best bets for today’s slate. Don’t miss our golf preview of the Barracuda Championship and we also have picks to win the trophy, best group bets and a Golden Boot play in our Women’s World Cup soccer betting guide.

Look out for more great betting content as it comes in throughout the day on our Analysis tab.

Stat of the Day

Positions of the last 5 Open Championship winners after the first round (most recent first): T3, T9, 2, T18, T1.

Quote of the Day

“They are well coached and we saw that tonight. They are one of the best teams in the Prem. And I think we were a mixed team from a lot of different clubs, and it’s always difficult.”

Nashville midfielder Hany Mukhtar was impressed by EPL team Arsenal, which beat the MLS All Stars 5-0 last night.

Pickswise is the home of free sports picks, news and best bets. Check out our expert NFL Picks, NBA Picks, MLB Picks and NHL Picks pages for our latest game picks.