Padres to soar past Cardinals on Tuesday night

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Monday night was a great one on the diamond. The Astros picked up a sweatless 10-0 no-hit victory over the Blue Jays while Shohei Ohtani delivered a double to go over his total bases in the nightcap.

We'll set our sights on another 2-0 card with a pair of plays for Tuesday night.

Cardinals (+115) @ Padres (-135)

The Padres have a massive pitching advantage in this game. Yu Darvish has already made a couple of regular-season starts and pitched marvelously, allowing one earned run over 8.2 innings of work while striking out 10 batters.

He owns a strikeout rate of nearly 28% and has posted an xwOBA of just .283 - miles above the MLB average (.316) and quite impressive considering the offenses Darvish faced. The Dodgers score nearly seven runs per game and the Giants rank top 10 in runs early this season.

Darvish now draws a Cardinals lineup that is struggling against right-handed pitching to the tune of a .274 xwOBA (25th), 30.2 K% (27th), and a 4.6% walk rate (29th).

With Darvish in quality form and more stretched out than almost every other pitcher in terms of regular-season reps, the Padres should be able to neutralize this Cardinals attack.

Miles Mikolas, meanwhile, will have a much more difficult time slowing down the Padres. He got lit up like a Christmas tree in his season debut, allowing a .377 xwOBA and 15.4% barrel rate. He ranks inside the bottom three in both categories among all pitchers with a start this season.

For all San Diego's faults, it has a potent offense led by Fernando Tatis Jr., Manny Machado, and Xander Bogaerts. The Padres are hitting .302 vs. righties and grade out very well in terms of contact rate and plate discipline. Oh, and they're also tied for the MLB lead in homers off right-handed pitchers.

Mikolas is a pitch-to-contact arm facing a team that requires you to miss bats. The Padres should be able to get to Mikolas early and often while Darvish is in a great spot to deliver a quality start.

Look for the Padres to rebound from a tough Monday night game and get right back in the win column.

Bet: Padres (-135)

Shane Bieber: Over 6.5 strikeouts

Is Bieber's strikeout prowess back? It sure looked that way in his season debut. The Guardians righty sat down 11 batters over six innings while posting sparkling metrics across the board.

He hammered the zone all game long: His strike rate was 8% above league average and he generated swings and misses with nearly 22% of his pitches. Only three starters induced those at a higher clip in their season debuts.

Yes, Bieber's electric performance came against an Athletics team that strikes out at a very high rate - but so do the Mariners. They own a 31.2 K% thus far, the highest mark in MLB.

The Mariners are more talented than the Athletics, but they're not hitting well right now. Their batting average and contact rates are low, and we're not seeing much plate discipline.

I'm not overly worried about the potential of a struggling offense chasing Bieber early in a pitcher-friendly park. He should be able to grind out a handful of innings and pile up seven punchouts (or more) along the way.

Todd Cordell is a sports betting writer at theScore. You can follow him on X at @ToddCordell.