Last year's NL Cy Young award winner has had a much tougher go of it this season. Sandy Alcantara is slated to make his 14th start of the year for the Miami Marlins as the teams take on the Washington Nationals in DC on Friday night. Alcantara comes into this one at 2-5 with a 4.75 ERA and will be opposed by 3-4 Trevor Williams. Williams has a 4.11 ERA in 13 starts and will look to get the last place Nats into the win column to start off their series with the second place Marlins.

Let's take a look at the odds for this AL East battle in the nation's capital.

Marlins vs. Nationals odds run line and total

Marlins vs. Nationals prediction and pick

The Marlins were able to salvage one game from their three-game series with the Seattle Mariners and will be happy to head back to the east coast. Luis Arraez especially because he did not record a hit the entire series and his average is now down to .378. Lucky for the Marlins, Jorge Soler has been red hot over the past week with three home runs and a 1.713 OPS hitting right behind Arraez.

The best hitter (for average) in baseball isn't going to slump for long, he's hitting .160 over the past week, but was nearly a .400 hitter heading into it. If he can find ways to get on base in front of Soler then the Miami offense will really take off.

The other thing that Miami needs is the team's ace to pitch like one. Last time out Alcantara went seven innings and allowed just one run. For the year his FIP is 3.78 which is a good sign going forward however, his changeup has a run value of two after being the best pitch in baseball last season with a -25 run value. That's a terrible sign and is the reason I'm going to take the over in Game 1 of this series.

Pick: Over

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Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change