Philadelphia Phillies vs San Diego Padres 10/21/22 MLB Picks, Predictions, Odds

The San Diego Padres and the Philadelphia Phillies meet Friday in game 3 of the NLCS MLB playoffs action from Citizens Bank Park. This will be game three in a best-of-seven National League Championship Series. The Phillies took the game one opener in a shutout, then the Padres evened it up with a three-run victory in game two. Check back all season long for free MLB picks at Sports Chat Place. 

San Diego couldn’t find much traction in the Tuesday opener of this series, notching just one hit (by Wil Myers) in a 2-0 shutout loss. Game two went much better for the Padres. San Diego found some significant offense on 13 team hits and powered out an 8-5 comeback victory. 

For the starter job in game three, San Diego will go with Joe Musgrove. In his 30 games during the regular season, Musgrove went 10-7 with a 2.93 ERA. In 181.0 innings total he managed 184 Ks. 

Over on the Phillies’ side, they managed just three hits in the game one shutout, but that was enough thanks to a solid Zack Wheeler start (7.0 innings; one hit; one walk). In game two, Philadelphia had a brief 4-0 lead but couldn’t hang on after giving up five runs in the fifth. 

Ranger Suarez will take the mound for the Friday start. Across 29 regular-season starts Suarez went 10-7 with a 3.65 ERA. In 155.1 innings total he had 129 strikeouts. 

The Padres are 4-1 in their last five overall and 8-3 in their last 11 road games. San Diego is 5-2 in their last seven versus the NL East.
Meanwhile, the Phillies are 4-0 in their last four after an off day and 6-2 in their last eight overall. Philly is 16-5 in their last 21 Friday games.

PICK: I might take a stab on the Phillies here. You could make a good case either way, however; this series may very well go six or seven games. In any case, Suarez has just a couple of appearances in October so far, most recently against the Braves in game one of the Division Series. Suarez went 3.1 innings with one earned on three hits and five walks in that one, so he’ll need a good bounce-back in game three. A quality start would be a good omen for Philly.

As for Musgrove, he’s got 13.0 innings with two earned on seven hits and four walks across his pair of postseason outings so far. I like Musgrove to put up another solid outing in this one, so Philly will likely have to turn it on in the later innings to power out a win here. Should be another great matchup.