Props · MLB

Schlittler and De La Cruz: 2 Props for Friday

By Cal Draper — Cal lives in the prop markets: hits, strikeouts, homers, the stuff the books price last and worst. He hunts small edges in matchup splits and park effects and swears the season is won a quarter-unit at a time.

Fri, Aug 28, 2026, 8:01 AM ET

How many batters does Cam Schlittler actually need to face for this number to work? That is the whole question on the Yankees right-hander, and the answer is fewer than you think.

Schlittler carries a 6.5 strikeout line at -133 on Fanatics, and the case starts with workload. He has thrown 158.0 innings this season, a full starter's share, so there is no pitch-count leash waiting to cut him off in the fifth. The Boston Red Sox lineup he faces strikes out in 21.3% of plate appearances against right-handed pitching, the 20th-highest rate in baseball, and Schlittler's own whiff rate sits at 26.1%. That is the mechanism: a swing-and-miss arm against a free-swinging lineup, with enough innings banked to see the order a third time.

The rate behind it is the cleanest on the slate. Schlittler is at 10.99 strikeouts per nine with a 2.16 ERA over those 158.0 innings, and his 0.96 WHIP means he is not walking his way out of strikeout chances. The Boston bats are not a pushover contact unit, but at 21.3% vs RHP they give him enough swings to miss. I have this at 6.8 against the posted 6.5, a half-strike cushion that the price at -133 does not fully charge you for.

The second look is the same market, different side of the plate. Elly De La Cruz is the Reds shortstop with a total bases line of 1.5 at +122, and the platoon split is the entire argument. Against left-handed pitching this season he is hitting .323/.386/.621 across 140 plate appearances, and that slugging number is the one that matters for total bases. David Peterson is the lefty he faces in Chicago, and the over has cashed in 4 of his last 10 with a 45% season hit rate.

What has to go wrong for De La Cruz to lose? He needs to avoid extra bases entirely, because a single plus a walk does not clear 1.5. But the .621 slugging against lefties means his singles tend to turn into doubles, and one hard-hit ball to the gap settles the ticket. At +122 you are getting paid to take the power side of a platoon mismatch, and I will take that price over the -164 on the under every time.

If you can only take one, take Schlittler. The strikeout line has the workload, the rate, and the opponent all pointing the same direction, and the -133 is fair for a half-strike edge. De La Cruz is the cheaper swing, but the Yankees right-hander is the spine of this card.

Schlittler's the anchor here; De La Cruz is the plus-money kicker if you want a second ticket on the board.