Marlins vs. Cubs prediction and odds for Friday, May 5 (Can Steele Keep this up?)

The Miami Marlins go on the road for a three-game weekend series with the Chicago Cubs, but they’ll be happy to get out of Miami after their series with the Atlanta Braves. Miami is still in the mix in the NL East, hovering around .500 though Atlanta has a commanding lead. Chicago is another team that’s been living right around .500 this year and they’re back at Wrigley Field after a four-game series in DC.

For Game 1 of this series the Marlins will hand the ball to Edward Cabrera to make his seventh start of the year and he comes in with a 4.67 ERA 2-2 record. On the other side, the Cubs will go with Justin Steele and that’s worked out well the other six times they’ve done that this year. Steele is 4-0 with a 1.49 ERA. 

Here are the odds for the Cubs and Marlins at Wrigley Field on Friday: 

Marlins vs. Cubs odds, run line and total

Marlins vs. Cubs prediction and pick

This is Justin Steele’s third season in the majors and it looks like he’s making a very real jump to become a top line starting pitcher. At age 27, he has been dominant, only allowing six earned runs through 36.1 innings. However, his dominance might be a little flimsy. He’s forcing a lot of soft contact, his hard hit percentage is 24.5% which is 96th percentile in baseball, but he’s also been lucky with a .239 BABIP. His expected ERA is 3.18 and his FIP is 3.48 and he only has an average strikeout rate of 23.0%.

Steele is a good pitcher that’s true and it’s important for the Cubs development as they round the corner on their rebuild, however, I don’t think he’s the ace that they’ll need to really compete at a high level.

The Marlins are 29th in runs scored and 20th in OPS, so they may not be the team to expose Steele, but regression is coming at some point. I just wouldn’t expect it tonight, I think he turns in another good start and the Cubs win Game 1 at home.

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Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change