On a light day for baseball, the Minnesota Twins will look to continue their reversal off an 0-4 start. They’ve won consecutive games where their bats have finally come to life with fourteen combined runs. Houston will be playing their first road series of the season, and Hunter Brown struggled last year against the Twins. He gave up his most hits on the season with twelve and seven runs. Back the Twins.

Really not much more than the Twins in their home opener and pitcher Joe Ryan is usually dependable. Excluding his injury-shortened start on Aug. 7, 2024 at the Cubs, Ryan has pitched 5.0+ innings in 26 straight starts. He was among AL leaders in 2024 in opponents' BA (.208) and walk rate (4.3%), and it was more of the same in his 2025 debut in St. Louis. The Twins went 25-8 against the AL West last season, for what that's worth. Houston's Hunter Brown can dominate but also get really wild.

Hunter Brown is a strikeout pitcher. The Astros need a lift here and I don't see them going easy on this kid, who dominated in the second half last season. He's faced the Twins 4 times and has at least 6 strikeouts in all of those meetings. He is over this in 8 of his last 10 starts dating back to last season. The Twins are averaging 7 Ks/G, so not terrible in that regard so far, but they are also notoriously slow starters.