Tiny Nick's Gambling Picks 08/26

Locks

MLB (0.5 Unit) Sandy Alcantara Over 2.5 Earned Runs (-110; Odds via DraftKings): 5:40 PM CT on Fanduel Sports South

Sandy has had consecutive quality starts, which defies his season-long trend of getting roughed up more often than not, but actually has been fairly common. It seems like once a month he puts together some games that remind us of the old Sandy, but then it all falls apart again with a string of blowup starts. In this instance I’m not even looking for a blowup, just a few runs allowed to a team that has consistently hit him well.

The Braves have seen Sandy twice this season, tagging him for 5 runs in Atlanta and 3 runs in Miami, and have a cumulative .295 average and .871 OPS as career numbers. So unless Sandy is back to his original form, which is highly unlikely, I think a Braves lineup that is finally healthy can get to him tonight.

MLB (0.75 Unit) Milwaukee Brewers Team Total Over 4.5 (+105; Odds via Caesars): 6:40 PM CT on ARID

I’m running this back from yesterday after the Brewers put a 7-spot on Arizona’s weak pitching. This is an even more favorable number because the Diamondbacks aren’t sending out a weak lefty to get mashed by Milwaukee’s dominance against that split. The Brewers are only a top-10 offense against righties instead of top-5, but they’ll face a starter that should be easy to hit. Brandon Pfaadt has been much worse on the road with a 6.50 ERA and .281 opponent on-base average, and let’s not forget how awful the Arizona bullpen is behind him. So with an opportunity to get back to their usual mashing ways, I think the Brewers put up another big number tonight.

WNBA (0.5 Unit) Seattle Storm/Indiana Fever Over 167.5 (-110; Odds via DraftKings): 6:00 PM CT on CBSSN

This total has been rising fast despite all the injury issues for Indiana, which actually never seem to matter. The Fever have been scoring like crazy without Caitlin Clark or Sophie Cunningham, highlighted by them putting up 90 and 84 points against the excellent Lynx defense this past week. But they can’t stop anything either, so this game has plenty of potential to fly over the total.

It’s a matchup of two teams who are really struggling on the defensive end in my opinion, as Seattle’s typically strong defense has faded in the second half of the season. The Storm are running it up on bad defenses though, and should be looking for revenge after Indiana took both previous meetings this season. While the first hit 180 points, the second only got to 152 thanks to combined 16.2% shooting from deep, so improvement there against weak defenses will send this over.

WNBA (0.5 Unit) Phoenix Mercury/LA Sparks Over 177.5 (-110; Odds via Caesars): 9:00 PM CT on NBA TV

Speaking of totals that are rising fast, this one opened high and just kept going. While neither of the previous two meetings reached this level of scoring, hitting 175 and 165 points, there’s plenty of reason to believe this one will be different. These teams are fully healthy now, which has been a major problem for Phoenix all season and significantly impacted those two games.

The Mercury were missing Kahleah Copper for both games and Alyssa Thomas for one, while the Sparks were down Rickea Jackson in both games and didn’t get Cameron Brink back until well after the second meeting. That is an incredible amount of offensive firepower being on the sidelines, and these teams being at full strength should mean they can score at will tonight. It’s a big number, but the impact of those key players should justify all the over steam that has hit this game as it turns into a track meet.

Degenerates

No degenerates today.

Past 7 days Tiny Tracker: 15-11 (+3.66 Units) – Recommend: Tail With Caution

Tiny Nick has been writing betting picks for Zone Coverage since 2020. Every day he will offer his Locks and Degenerate picks. Locks are what he’s most confident in, while Degenerates are entertaining but riskier picks.