He also played the full-game over, noting Oakland is 5-2 to the over in its last seven and Houston is 6-4 to the over in the last ten head-to-head meetings. Even if McCullers contains the A’s, Severino’s form and Oakland’s 6.07 team ERA on the road should allow the Astros to clear the total almost by themselves.

Cash Out Sports Picks backed the Astros on the money line. Houston is 7-2 in its last nine at Minute Maid against Oakland while the Athletics have gone just 3-7 as road underdogs. Oakland has won only once since May 14 and sends Luis Severino, who has yielded 25 hits and 14 runs over his previous 22 innings. Lance McCullers Jr. is trending the opposite direction, surrendering only two earned in his last 8.1 frames. With Houston’s offense heating up and Oakland floundering, the tout believes the Astros roll at home.

Kenny G advised taking Oakland at +110, calling Luis Severino "so freaking good recently." Severino’s current run prevention has kept the A’s competitive even while the club around him craters. Houston counters with Lance McCullers Jr. (6.57 ERA) whom Kenny still doesn’t trust after allowing 7 baserunners in 4.1 innings against Seattle. The Astros’ lineup has flashed 11-5-2-3-9 runs the last five games, yet still sits just 20th in MLB scoring and 19th in slugging on the season. Oakland’s own issues—a 6.01 bullpen ERA and an offense sliding from top-10 to league-average—are baked into the number, but Kenny believes Severino can hang long enough to make the plus-money dog worth a sprinkle. He passed on the 8.5-run total and would lean Over rather than Under, but the Athletics moneyline is his actionable play.

In contrast, Malcolm Bamford bet the full-game over 8, leaning on Lance McCullers’ tendency to get dragged into shootouts. Houston is 4-0 to the over in McCullers’ starts this year, including a wild nine-run outing against Cincinnati. While Severino has dominated on the road, Bamford trusts neither Oakland’s bullpen nor its offense to let the under survive late innings. With McCullers allowing hard contact (8.4% barrel rate) and Severino susceptible once he turns the lineup over for a third time, Bamford projects both pens getting involved before the seventh and pushing the total past eight.

Rockford played the Astros first-five team total under, banking on Luis Severino’s surprising road form. The former Yankee has a 0.72 ERA in four road starts for Oakland and consistently works into the sixth inning. Lance McCullers Jr. has been inconsistent at Minute Maid, and Rockford’s model showed Houston should be –130 rather than the –150 posted. Because he can’t trust the punch-less A’s offense to cash a side, he expects Severino to suppress the Astros to one run or fewer through five.

Cooper emphasized that Houston owns the slate’s highest stack optimal rate (17.95%) thanks to bargain salaries across the lineup—Jose Altuve at $3.9K, Jeremy Pena at $4K, Jake Meyers at $3.5K and Yainer Diaz at $3.4K. With nearly a five-run implied total, the Astros are projected to be the most popular stack, but the salary relief makes them hard to ignore. Cooper advised either embracing Houston while getting contrarian at pitcher or fading them entirely for leverage, noting that many profitable builds will start with an Astros five-man core.

Cooper highlighted Hunter Brown as the premium arm offering positive leverage. Brown faces an Oakland lineup with a minuscule 3.06 implied total and owns the slate’s highest optimal percentage at 31%, yet projects for only 27% ownership. With a strike-out happy Athletics roster in a pitcher-friendly environment, Brown brings the highest raw projection on the slate. Cooper views him as the ideal anchor in GPP builds, especially paired with another contrarian SP or an off-the-board stack.

Mills Young recommended Hunter Brown over 6.5 strikeouts, projecting the Astros right-hander for 8 Ks. Brown has cleared 6.5 in 60% of his trips to the mound, and Young framed tonight as a classic bounce-back after Brown’s worst outing of the year in which he was tagged for homers and failed to hit his prop. Facing an Oakland lineup that has struggled to make contact, the bettor consensus leans over and Young is riding with them.

Malcolm Bamford played under 7.5 in Oakland–Houston, pointing out that the Astros have faced a left-handed starter only six times all season and own a modest .228 team average against southpaws. JP Sears draws them after two rough outings (10 ER), yet held opponents to nine earned across the previous six and sports far better road splits. Hunter Brown counters with a 0.96 ERA at Minute Maid and hasn’t allowed more than three earned in any 2025 start. Both pens grade as serviceable, and Bamford expects unfamiliarity with Sears plus Brown’s home dominance to keep the scoreboard muted—something like 3-2 either way.

Kingpin Sports laid ‑1.5 with Houston, praising Hunter Brown’s 6-3 record and 2.04 ERA. They expect the Astros’ bats to jump J.P. Sears (4-4, 4.00) early and let Brown dominate from the mound.

In Tuesday’s Astros–Athletics clash, Data Skrive highlighted Miguel Andujar’s quietly sizzling bat as the lone reason to lean into an otherwise lopsided matchup (Houston -207). Andujar carries a 12-game hitting streak — tied for the second-longest active run in MLB — into a duel with right-hander Cristian Javier, whose four-seam velocity is down 1.4 mph and whose opponents’ batting average has jumped from .206 to .264 year-over-year. During the streak Andujar owns a .392/.417/.588 line with hits in 22 of 56 batted-ball events (39% hit rate) and an xBA of .331. Data Skrive recommended leveraging the streak via a simple ‘to record a hit’ prop (priced around -280) or plus-money Over 1.5 Total Bases (+115), noting that Andujar has cleared that number in seven of the 12 games thanks to an 11% barrel rate that dwarfs his career mark. Even if Oakland ultimately falls, Andujar’s current approach (27% line-drive rate, career-best 6.9% swing-and-miss) makes the hit prop a viable standalone play.

Lonte Smith grabbed Oakland around +165, arguing the market underrates JP Sears’ road form (3.12 ERA away from the Coliseum) and Houston’s persistent struggles versus lefties. The Astros are batting only .223 at home and .230 against south-handed pitching despite a gaudy overall .270 clip the last ten games. Hunter Brown’s underlying numbers remain strong, but his pitch-count spikes have limited him to six innings or fewer in four of five, exposing a Houston bullpen that blew two saves last week. Smith projected a tight 4-3 Athletics win and likes pairing the money-line with full-game under parlays.

Despite four Overs in the last five meetings, Cash Out Sports Picks prefers the Under because the total scoring has only averaged 8.8 runs in that span and both line-ups are currently cold. Oakland has posted three or fewer runs in 7-of-12, while Houston has been held to four or fewer in 7-of-9. Both clubs were idle Monday, a spot the tout believes can produce slow offensive starts. Season-to-date, Unders have already cashed 52 times in games involving these teams. With Hunter Brown’s 0.96 home ERA anchoring one side and no obvious offensive momentum on either, a sub-total game script is projected.

Kenny G labeled Houston –210 his potential “lock of the day.” He expects Hunter Brown to rebound after his lone clunker of 2025 (5 IP, 5 ER at Tampa). Prior to that, the 25-year-old righty was 6-2 with a 1.59 ERA, including an eight-inning gem in Arlington. Oakland provides the perfect get-right spot: the A’s bullpen is third-worst (6.02 ERA) and their once-surprising offense has cooled, posting just 3.8 runs per game over the last week. Meanwhile the Astros own MLB’s second-best relief corps (2.97 ERA) and are 18-10 at Minute Maid Park while cashing unders 17 of 28 times, illustrating how well the staff is throwing. With Brown’s strike-throwing, a rested high-leverage bullpen and an opponent leaking runs late, Kenny is comfortable swallowing the hefty price instead of fooling with the 7.5 total.

Cash Out Sports Picks backed the Astros to win and cover, pointing to a perfect storm of Houston edges. The Astros are 18-5 at Dakin Park (tied for most home wins in MLB) and are slashing .280/.343/.455 as a team at home compared to Oakland’s .244 road average. Hunter Brown has allowed only two earned runs across 18.2 Dakin Park innings this year and dominated the A’s last season in an 8-1 victory. Four of Houston’s last seven wins overall – and each of their last five against Oakland – came by three-plus runs. With the A’s coming off an 11-game skid and producing three runs or fewer in seven of their last 12, the tout expects another multi-run Houston result.

Scott Jenstad recommended tossing a few speculative bucks at Jacob Lopez after the rookie shredded Philadelphia for 8 strikeouts, 3 hits and 1 walk in his second MLB start. Jenstad noted Lopez carried a 28 % strike-out rate in Triple-A last season and still misses bats with a flat-plane four-seamer and plus changeup. Walks (career 10 % in the minors) are the red flag, and Jenstad warned that summer heat in the A’s temporary ballpark could add homer risk. Even so, with starting-pitching options thin, he views Lopez as a swing-and-miss lottery ticket worth rostering in 15-teamers and streaming in deeper 12-team leagues while the rotation spot is his.

Scott Jenstad said fantasy managers should act now on Shea Langeliers because the underlying skills suggest a true breakout is brewing. Langeliers has chopped his strike-out rate from 27 % last season to 16 % over the past month while simultaneously pushing his walk rate northward. The power never left—he is carrying a 46 % hard-hit rate and already put one 430-foot shot on the batter’s eye this week—but the new contact profile dramatically raises his batting-average floor. Jenstad noted the BABIP is still depressed, which means batting-average regression should be coming as long as the strike-out rate stabilizes in the low-20 % range. Add in his surprising sprint speed for a catcher and a full slate of summer games in a spacious park, and Jenstad expects Langeliers to settle in as a top-12 fantasy catcher ROS rather than a waiver-wire streamer.

Scott Jenstad advised fantasy managers not to panic over Mason Miller’s 6.11 ERA after Saturday’s blown save. Miller still sports a 40 % strike-out rate and a ridiculous 20.7 % swinging-strike rate while averaging 101 mph, metrics that point to true dominance. The inflated ERA stems from a .414 BABIP, a 13 % walk rate that is higher than last year’s profile, and a couple of poorly located 101-mph fastballs that left the yard. His underlying xFIP sits at 2.21, indicating massive positive regression once the BABIP stabilizes and the walks tick down. Jenstad’s takeaway: keep starting Miller with confidence or trade for him at a discount before the luck turns around.