How I Bet: Home Run Player Props
One of the biggest questions I get during the MLB season is, "How do you choose players to target for Home Run props and parlays?"
There are very few bets more fun and electric than choosing 2 or 3 guys to all hit a HR on the same night, and then you see 1 or 2 of them immediately hit one out and the dopamine starts to hit... you're suddenly glued to the action of that last hitter—even if just following along on the ESPN app on your phone anytime he is about to come up—it's summertime bliss.
We all want to say we cashed a +4000, +6400 or even +12000 parlay, and with the right approach to Home Runs, you just might this coming season. (Yes, I hit all of those last year.)
There is no short answer to the original question, as I use a lot of data points to determine who has the best chance to hit one out on any given night. A lot of cappers love to just use BvP (Batter vs. Pitcher), and although this can be helpful in certain scenarios, it is just a tiny piece of the pie.
Alright, so... This is about to get super nerdy and in the weeds of how I attack Home Run props. If that sounds like your kind of thing, crack a beer/coffee/energy drink and let's dig in!...
#1 TEAM IMPLIED TOTALS
This is just simple math. If a team is projected to score a lot of runs, there is naturally a higher chance that one or more of their hitters will hit a home run. I love this as the starting point for my HR props because Vegas has already put a ton of work in for you to get to this implied number: opposing starting pitcher, opposing bullpen, ballpark, weather, batter vs pitcher data, etc. It is all baked into this number. You can calculate your own Team Implied Totals based on the juice on any given game for each team, as well as the O/U of total runs (there are also multiple websites that offer it). Knowing a team's opening implied total is big, but so is tracking it throughout the day—if it does nothing but go up from the opening number, that is an excellent sign that sharp money expects a lot of offense. Conversely, if it goes down throughout the day, it may be a sign to temper the offensive expectations a bit. This is one of the reasons to wait until later in the day to place any HR props. The other even more important reason to wait is the fact that lineups can vary quite a bit from one day to the next. Some guys could suddenly go from hitting 7th to 2nd, giving their HR odds a substantial boost. Also, someone could be a late scratch or get a rest day, and you obviously do not want any parlays with them built into it at that point.
#2 STARTING PITCHER HR RATE
Besides wanting a high team implied total, you also want to know if the SP a team is facing gives up a lot of HRs or not. There are plenty of bad pitchers who get knocked around and allow a ton of runs, but are average (or sometimes even above average) at not giving up the long ball. On the flip side, there are a ton of good to great SPs who may have great K-rates and solid ERAs—and we generally think of them as really good pitchers—but they give up a ton of HRs. Gerrit Cole & Robbie Ray immediately come to mind. I had a lot of success targeting Cole at home and Ray on the road last year (this will make even more sense once we get to Park Factors!).
#3 HITTER'S ISOLATED POWER & HR RATE
This one is obvious, but it is still worth stating: hitters with more power are going to hit a lot more HRs. I don't care if someone like Eric Hosmer is 5-for-7 against a guy with 3 HRs. He is never making it into a HR parlay in 2023 (ok maybe in one or two parks if the price is right lol, but in general: no thank you). He does not have the kind of raw power you are looking for to consistently cash in on HR props, and especially for use in HR parlays. In case you are not already familiar with who is considered to be a "power hitter" in today's game, you can easily look up Isolated Power (ISO) on all of the main baseball stat websites. You can also look up HR leaders, HRs per PA, etc.
#4 HITTER'S ISOLATED POWER BY PITCH TYPE
This one is a secondary data point off of #3, and it applies specifically to the SP that the best hitters are facing. Some guys feast on curve balls, some mash high fastballs, some even prefer to hit anything slow that is down and away. Knowing a hitter's favorite pitch type, and if that plays into the strengths or weaknesses of the opposing starter can prove to be a large edge. You can look up ISO vs specific pitch types on multiple websites, and you can also look up SPs pitch arsenal (and how effective or ineffective each of their pitches are). It is a really nice way to find spots to attack, as the chance of a hitter really putting a charge into a ball inevitably goes up.
#5 HITTER'S R/L SPLITS (& PITCHER'S)
This is sometimes overlooked but is one of the largest disparities you will find. In general, a right-handed hitter will have better offensive numbers against left-handed pitching (and vice versa), especially for power numbers. There are exceptions to this—both for hitters and pitchers—but in general, facing a SP who throws opposite of the side a hitter bats from gives a natural boost to the likelihood a ball will leave the yard. There are extreme examples of this (look up Albert Pujols' splits last season), and there are a lot of modest ones, but they all give a bump to your HR chances. I automatically pull R/L split data into my model, and I always check it before adding someone to my HR player pool for any given slate. You do need to be aware of those few reverse split players as well though, as a ton of value can be found utilizing them in the correct ways.
#6 BULLPEN HR RATE
Much like starters (see #2 above), bullpens can give up a lot of runs but not necessarily HRs, and vice versa. A large factor in this is the ballpark where they pitch half of their games, but the overall data still matters. The Cubs had a better bullpen ERA than 9 other teams, but they gave up the most HRs by far in 2022. This was due in large part to multiple crazy windy series at home, but it is still valuable information to have. The same goes for Milwaukee, Washington, and Tampa Bay: they all had very solid ERAs but were top 6 in HRs allowed. This can be a legit deciding factor when you are debating between Nolan Arenado hitting at Wrigley Field or Aaron Judge hitting in Detroit as the last leg of your HR parlay (the Tigers pen gave up the 3rd fewest HRs, and Comerica was dead last in HR park factors in 2022). Outside of the opposing starters and potential weather, this is a massive advantage for Arenado 9 times out of 10—and he would have a better price/juice than Judge every single time.
#7 BATTER vs PITCHER
Ok, I finally decided it was time to throw this one out there. I do use it, and it does carry value as one of the many data points in my model. It is just not this giant deciding factor that some think it is—the biggest reason being sample size. A hitter being 2-for-3 with 2 HRs against a pitcher is great, but that is such a small amount of data to buy into without all of the other factors above also in the mix. The same goes for a hitter being 28-for-45 with 7 HRs. Yes, that is an amazing point in favor of the hitter, but this likely means multiple years and growth/change for both the hitter and the pitcher. The hitter could be past his prime now, the pitcher could've gone from a struggling rookie to an all-star, and so much more. This is why I would put a lot more stock into the hitters ISO from the current or previous year, as opposed to what he has done against a SP over the last 5+ years. At the end of the day, I like to think of BvP as a tie-breaker of sorts. It will never be the sole reason I do or do not place a bet, but it can help confirm one.
Also, only looking at HRs is an ineffective way to use and judge BvP. If you are going to use it, you should focus first on slugging percentage (or a similar power measuring stat). This way, you are including more balls that were hit hard—even if they stayed in the yard as doubles or triples. I want to know if a guy consistently made great contact against a pitcher, and not just if he was able to clear the fence X number of times.
#8 BALLPARK FACTORS
This is arguably one of the most important things I look at, but all of the previous boxes still need to be checked before it truly matters. I know off the top of my head if a park is considered a HR park or a hitter's park, but you can easily check up on this yourself. Statcast park effects is the thing to use (just Google it, or find it on Baseball Savant), as they accurately use data from all parks played in by players in order to determine which parks give a bump to runs, HRs, etc.
The leader for HR factors in 2022 was far and away GABP where the Reds play, with 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th all being close together (the homes of the White Sox, Dodgers, Angels, and Phillies). Coors Field, which has historically been a well-known place for extra runs due to the thin air and large outfield, finished 6th (still great, but not the best). The humidors being installed in all 30 ballparks seems to have caused some unexpected changes to the overall ranks.
Here are all home ballparks in order from best HR factor in 2022 to least: CIN, CHW, LAD, LAA, PHI, COL, MIL, NYY, TOR, BAL, WAS, BOS, HOU, CLE, ATL, TEX, CHC, SEA, NYM, SDP, MIN, TBR, SEA, PIT, ARI, STL, SFG, KCR, OAK, DET
I strongly recommend using this list at the start of the season, as this was the first full season using league-wide humidors. Historical data before this may be helpful, but would be less accurate in theory. As the 2023 season unfolds, you can also obviously start to weigh that as well (my model pulls it in as it happens and adds it to the 2022 averages at a weighted ratio to reflect the current seasonal environment, which could be drastically different depending on the baseballs used in 2023).
#9 WEATHER
This directly ties into #8 of course, but it can still have a lot of daily variance that you want to monitor. Temperature matters the most, as all offensive metrics go up when it is warmer out. Humidity, altitude, and barometric pressure matter too, but they can basically be lumped into one statement: warmer temps is better for home runs. And then of course, we have wind. It is not as black and white as "oh, the wind is blowing out at 15 MPH in Minnesota, so let's fire up the HRs!". Every ballpark handles wind differently. Playing in Wrigley, you could see a 3-run and 3 HR bump to the offense with even just a 8 MPH breeze out to left center. Conversely, 20 MPH gusts out to right in San Francisco would have less impact due to the park being engineered to better withstand that kind of environment. I can't believe this is the first time I have mentioned this website, but Ballpark Pal is a nice spot to quickly look at wind factors (and also field dimensions and general HR factors for today's offensive environment).
#10 PRICE (aka JUICE)
This only plays a role for me as a tie-breaker of sorts. If I think both Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton have similar chances of hitting a HR tonight, I am going to gladly take Stanton at (+280) as opposed to Judge at (+110). In general however, the books are pretty sharp: if they think one hitter is more likely to hit one out, you may want to listen when it comes to building out any parlay above 2 legs.
Now that you've taken a look behind the curtain, I hope this can be something you come back to or reference in the future as you try to chase that elusive HR Player Prop parlay hit in 2023. You also now probably see why I often parlay players from the same team or even just the same game—they end up being the most likely to hit one out on that slate due to all of the factors above.
One important thing to note: even though I have had a lot of success with HR Props, they never take up more than 0.2u for any given bet. I always say "always just sprinkles for me!" and I mean it. I prefer to place a wager of 0.1u or 10% of my typical wager amount on any given HR Prop, so unless I specifically state otherwise, that is what I am risking. At the end of the day, no matter how prepared you are, or how long you were in the lab as the kids say, HR Props are still long-shot bets. I love them. They are a blast. But they are still just extra side action that I never intend to use as actual bankroll builders—even if I continue to land green on them again in 2023 ;)
