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Posted at 11:00 AM EST. Odds are subject to change.

Washington -1½ +160 over San Diego

7:05 PM EST. This play has very little to do with Washington's starter and almost everything to do with fading San Diego and a starting pitcher that appears to be living on borrowed time.

Lucas Giolito (RHP – SD) enters with a shiny 2.70 ERA that looks impressive on the surface, but the underlying numbers tell an entirely different story. Giolito owns a staggering 6.03 expected ERA, the largest gap between ERA and xERA among qualified major league starters. That type of discrepancy is rarely sustainable. Through 10 innings, Giolito has walked eight batters while striking out only five. His swing-and-miss rate sits at just 7.3% and his ground-ball rate is a concerning 29%. Those are not the indicators of a pitcher dominating hitters. They're the indicators of a pitcher escaping damage that should already be on the board.

Giolito's profile suggests a correction is coming. When pitchers stop missing bats, stop generating ground balls, and continue allowing contact, bad things tend to happen eventually. The market is pricing Giolito based on his ERA while ignoring all the warning signs underneath.

Paxton Schultz (RHP – WAS) is expected to handle only a few innings before turning the game over to the Nationals' bullpen. That's perfectly fine. The starter for Washington is largely irrelevant in this matchup because the value comes from attacking Giolito and a Padres club that enters this game having lost four straight.

San Diego's offense has cooled considerably during this losing streak and now heads out on the road trying to halt the slide. Meanwhile, Washington gets the benefit of seeing a pitcher whose current results simply do not match the quality of his performance. Sooner or later those numbers are going to meet in the middle, and when they do, it could get ugly in a hurry. Washington on the run line is the bet. 

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