2023 MLB Betting Preview: Royals, Athletics, Marlins, Brewers Value Picks to Go Under Regular Season Win Totals

We looked 10 days ago at four baseball teams for whom optimism feels particularly springy as Opening Day approaches. Now, for the other side of the coin — four teams whose over/under forecasts portend pessimism. All odds from DraftKings as of March 13.

Kansas City Royals under 69.5 wins

The pennant-winning 2014 season and World Series-winning 2015 encore seem like fever dreams at this point for the Royals, who have fallen short of 70 wins in three of the last four full seasons (and were at a 70-win pace during the pandemic-shortened 2020 campaign) and look like a worse team than last year’s 65-97 edition.

New general manager J.J. Picollo traded the Royals’ top position player per WAR at Baseball Reference, Michael A. Taylor, to the Minnesota Twins for a pair of minor league pitchers and dealt injury-prone but promising speedster Adalberto Mondesi — who stole 119 bases in just 286 games the last five seasons — to the Boston Red Sox for reliever Josh Taylor.

Today I saw a much more trim and fit @Royals Franmil Reyes hit a homer to right center. His clone, @CleGuardians Johnkensy Noel also homered. Reyes looks much better. Noel needs lots and lots of repetition and instruction IMO. He's one big guy. But he's powerful.

— Bernie Pleskoff (@BerniePleskoff) March 12, 2023

The Royals’ biggest additions were Jordan Lyles, a solid if unspectacular mid-rotation type, and perhaps Franmil Reyes, who has hit 30 homers twice in a season and signed a minor league deal with Kansas City in February. Even in a typically mediocre AL Central, it’s hard to see a path even to the fringes of contention as the Royals embark upon another long rebuild.

Oakland Athletics under 60.5 wins

Speaking of long rebuilds…after decades of contending on a budget and retooling instead of rebuilding, the Athletics ripped the Band-Aid off in painful fashion last season. After shedding six of their top 10 players from the 2021 roster, per WAR, prior to and following the lockout, the Athletics finished with 102 losses, the most for the franchise since Rickey Henderson’s rookie season in 1979.

The 1980 Athletics won 83 games under Billy Martin, but it’s hard to see history repeating itself even with the new stolen base-friendly rules turning speedy Esteury Ruiz (85 steals between Double-A, Triple-A and the majors last season) into a candidate to make a Henderson-like chase at 100 stolen bases.

Esteury Ruiz showin' off the speed 🏃‍♂️💨 pic.twitter.com/HL5422CaWt

— A's on NBCS (@NBCSAthletics) March 10, 2023

Sean Murphy and Cole Irvin, the only players to finish with more than 2.0 WAR last season, were traded to the Atlanta Braves and Baltimore Orioles, respectively, with Ruiz serving as the main return in the former trade.

Thirty-somethings such as Aledmys Diaz, Jace Peterson, Trevor May and Jesus Aguilar were signed to placeholder deals but will likely be on the market in July. Even with the new schedule format giving the Athletics fewer intra-divisional games in a loaded AL West, another 100-plus losses seem likely.

Florida Marlins under 76.5 wins

The Marlins, who have won 77 or fewer games in 10 of the last 11 full seasons, have a promising rotation headed by reigning NL Cy Young Award winner Sandy Alcantara and a rest of the roster that didn’t get any worse over the winter.

But it didn’t get a whole lot better, either, in an NL East that features the Atlanta Braves, New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies all engaging in their own baseball arms race. The Braves added Murphy, the Mets retained Brandon Nimmo and signed Justin Verlander and the Phillies signed Trea Turner, all of which dwarfs the Marlins inking Jean Segura and making an intriguing baseball trade by sending Pablo Lopez to the Twins for AL batting champion Luis Arraez.

The Marlins won’t be Washington Nationals-esque bad, but they’re not eight or more wins better than last season’s 69-93 team.

Milwaukee Brewers under 85.5 wins

Wagering is all about ignoring the vibes and looking at the hard data. But hoo boy, the vibes are not good around the Brewers, who cratered after trading Josh Hader to the San Diego Padres at the trade deadline last July and alienated former Cy Young Award-winning ace Corbin Burnes during a contentious arbitration hearing last month.

The Brewers look solid enough with a rotation headed by Burnes and fellow flame-throwers Freddy Peralta and Brandon Woodruff, a bullpen anchored by Devin Williams and a lineup led by star infielders Willy Adames and Luis Urias. But the Hader trade signified the start of a retooling/rebuilding project, and those rarely stop once they begin.

The Brewers could both contend in the downcast NL Central in the first half and deal from their strengths at the deadline, which is the recipe for a dissatisfying 84-win campaign