Cleveland Guardians (4-2) at Minnesota Twins (3-2)
Game Info: Thursday, April 4th, 2024 at 4:10 p.m. EST (Target Field)
Betting Odds: Guardians ML (+130) - Over/Under (7.5)
Pick: Guardians ML (+130)
These two American League Central division rivals will meet for the first time this season here on Thursday night. As the Cleveland Guardians will face off with the Minnesota Twins for the first of 13 times this season. For the last several seasons, it has been Minnesota and Cleveland neck and neck coming down to the final stretch of the season regarding the Central division and it seems likely that will be the case once again this year. It is a long road until September and it’ll start now as the winner of this head to head match up will likely end up taking the division as well. This should be a solid game between two of the hottest teams in the AL to start off the year.
Cleveland is off to a solid start this season and they will look to keep the momentum rolling when they open up this weekend series with Minnesota. They are coming off of a series against the Seattle Mariners where Cleveland dropped two out of three games, and they will look to rebound here on Thursday night on the road. This will be their seventh consecutive game of the season and they still have three more to play after this before they finally return home to open up their home slate. It is certainly a daunting task ahead of Cleveland over the next four days but if they can grab a good start on the road, it should give them plenty of confidence heading home and plenty of momentum to ride throughout the month of April.
Cleveland comes into this game as winners of four out of their first six on the season and they have put up several solid offensive displays. They will need to record another solid offense outburst in this game if they want to beat the Minnesota Twins in the opening game of this series on Thursday night. Their pitching has been solid and Tanner Bibee will make his second start of the season here in this one. Although he did look a little shaky in his debut start against Oakland, he was still able to settle down and pick up the victory. He will look for win number two of the year here on Thursday night against Minnesota.
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It has been an above average start of the season for Minnesota as they come into this game with a three and two record through their first five games of the season. They will look to grab a solid victory over a division rival in the opening game of this series at home as they face off with Cleveland. Minnesota is expected to be one of the favorites to win the division this year and make some noise in the playoffs. It starts with grabbing victories within your own division and that is something they will look to do here in this one against a solid, Cleveland team that has been playing well to open up the 2024 Major League Baseball season.
Minnesota has given Cleveland a lot of trouble and vice versa over the last several seasons and this pitching matchup should provide us with a low scoring solid game. They are coming off of a split series with Milwaukee where they picked up the victory and the finale and they put seven runs on the board in the process. Pablo Lopez gets the baseball for his second start of the season and he was solid in his first outing. He will look to lead Minnesota to another victory here on Thursday, while picking up his second victory of the season himself. However, he will have his hands full against an Guardians lineup that is red hot to open up the season.
Betting trends to consider in this matchup:
- Cleveland is 4-2 on the road this season
- Cleveland is 3-1 after a win
- Minnesota is 1-1 without rest
I expect this to be a solid pitching matchup between Lopez and Bibee here on Thursday when Cleveland and Minnesota open up their season series. In the end I look for Cleveland to pull out the series opening victory on Thursday as I look for them to get the best of Minnesota late in the game and I look for their offense to break through for a couple key runs to put this one away. Cleveland has looked like a well oiled machine throughout the early part of the season on the road and I don’t see that changing in this game on Thursday.
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