Detroit Tigers vs. Kansas City Royals MLB Picks, Odds, Predictions 6/14/2021

The Detroit Tigers and the Kansas City Royals meet in an AL Central division matchup in MLB action from Kauffman Stadium on Monday night.

The Detroit Tigers will try to rebound from a 4-1 loss at the hands of the Chicago White Sox in Sunday’s series finale. Eric Haase had a double for the lone Baltimore base hit and Niko Goodrum had the Tigers’ lone RBI as the rest of the Tigers went 0 for 24 with 11 strikeouts in the losing effort. Kyle Funkhouser threw 2.2 scoreless innings in the start, but it was Tyler Alexander that took the loss in relief to fall to 0-1 on the year. Matthew Boyd will start here and is 3-6 with a 3.56 ERA and 54 strikeouts this season. In his career, Boyd is 7-11 with a 5.57 ERA and 101 strikeouts against Kansas City.

The Kansas City Royals will look to rebound from a 6-3 loss at the hands of the Oakland A’s last time out. Carlos Santana and Andrew Benintendi each had a solo home run while Nicky Lopez added an RBI as well to cap off the scoring for the Royals in the losing effort. Salvador Perez went 2 for 3 with a double and Whit Merrifield had a base hit as well to cap off KC’s offense as the Royals had just six hits as a team in the loss. Kris Bubic took the loss, falling to 1-2 on the year after allowing five runs on seven hits while striking out five over 4.2 innings of work. Brad Keller will start here and is 6-5 with a 5.75 ERA and 55 strikeouts this season. In his career, Keller is 4-3 with a 2.85 ERA and 33 strikeouts against Detroit.

Detroit is 32-75 in their last 107 road games and 78-168 in their last 246 games overall while the under is 11-4-1 in their last 16 games as an underdog. Kansas City is 6-1 in their last 7 games as a favorite and 6-2 in their last 8 home games while the over is 4-1 in their last 5 series-opening games. Detroit is 5-13 in the last 18 meetings between these two teams in Kansas City.

I get a case that could be made for either side here, as Boyd’s been one of the better pitchers for Detroit in the last couple of years and Keller’s still got a winning record for the Royals with his bloated ERA. Instead, I’m going to side with the over here as both starters come into this game in relatively poor form as Boyd was roughed up in his last start vs. KC and Keller had a tough time against the Angels last time out.