Marsh Will Spoil Montgomery's Return

Diamondbacks vs Royals, 8:10 ET

I need to start keeping a list. Mentally I have one, but I need to actually write down the list of players that I need to fully ignore and never bet on a game they participate in. I do it every year with the NBA - for whatever reason some team just gets the best of me, so at a certain point I barely pay attention to their games. This year, with baseball, I have two guys that I think I haven't gotten a single win on and both are in the NL Central. First, Miles Mikolas gets the best of me every time, and now Mitch Keller is one that I avoided for months, but tried again yesterday. He burned me once again. Knowing who kills you is just as, if not more, important as knowing who makes you a lot of money. Both of these teams have made me some good money this season as the Diamondbacks take on the Royals.

The Diamondbacks are above .500, and playing good baseball. There were two teams that most writers discussed as needing to get healthy in order to turn their season around. The Rangers were one team, and the Diamondbacks are the other. The biggest issue is that Arizona had three of their starters on the injured list and they all should be back soon. Jordan Montgomery, today's starter, is one of the guys who was out since the end of June. They probably should have had him come out sooner as he wasn't pitching well for most of this season. Montgomery is 6-5 with a 6.44 ERA. He also is sporting a 1.68 WHIP, so there isn't much reason to believe that he is going to improve. In 13 starts this season, Montgomery has allowed four or more earned runs in five of them. The problem is that when he is bad, he is really bad. He has allowed six or more earned runs in four games this season. In all four of the starts, he went four or fewer innings. His last start before going on the injured list he went 2.2 innings, allowed 10 hits, and seven earned runs. One thing to note about him is that this isn't the result of allowing a ton of home runs. He's allowed only eight homers in his 65.2 innings, which comes out to one every eight innings. Instead, teams are stringing together hits against him. Overall, the Royals have seen Montgomery a few times with 32 at-bats against him and nine hits. However, Hunter Renfroe accounts for 21 of them and seven of the hits. So the rest of the team is 2-for-11 against Montgomery.

Jun 16, 2024; Phoenix, Arizona, USA; Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Jordan Montgomery (52) pitches against the Chicago White Sox during the first inning at Chase Field. Mandatory Credit: Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports

The Royals are having a great season, but for some reason, I feel like there is a rug that will be pulled out from underneath them. Like a few other teams, they are very good at home, but they've struggled on the road. They play this one in the comfort of their own home, where they are 35-18, so that should give them a little more credit toward winning. They are hitting better than expected this season with a .250 batting average, which isn't much lower than they were last season, but they averaging about a half run per game more than they did last year. That means the biggest difference is probably the pitching. Last season, the team ERA was 5.17, but this year the team is pitching to a 3.71 ERA. Alec Marsh hasn't been the best starter for the Royals. Marsh has a 7-6 record with a 4.52 ERA which isn't great. However, he does have a 1.23 WHIP which means he could be getting worse results than he is actually performing. There are only a few games that stand out as truly poor performances. Marsh has gotten worse as the season goes along. In April, he had a 2.70 ERA, then in May, he had a 3.86 ERA, 5.68 in June, and now 7.20 in three July outings. Eugenio Suarez is the only hitter to have any experience against Marsh and he is 0-for-5 with three strikeouts.

This game is a bit of a tossup as you have two teams that are both playing good baseball, but two pitchers that have been rather inconsistent. I'd expect Montgomery to only pitch a few innings in this one - five at most, and he probably would need to be rather efficient. The Royals are just -110 to win through five innings and I think they have a better chance here to win than the Diamondbacks. Although Marsh isn't great, he is better at home. Back the Royals to win through five.