The 2026 Major League Baseball season makes it to the first big holiday - Memorial Day. We have 13 games on the slate, including seven matinee games with a first pitch of 5:05 p.m. ET or earlier. The New York Yankees and Kansas City Royals meet at 3:40 p.m. ET on ESPN in the only nationally-televised game. Below are our top MLB player props for Monday, May 25th.
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Monday's Top MLB Player Props
(Odds courtesy of DraftKings Sportsbook)
Ben Brown Over 5.5 Strikeouts (+101)
The skidding Cubs turn to former relief pitcher turned starter Ben Brown to get the team back into the win column. Brown is starting to get stretched out, and with longer outings come higher strikeout totals.
Last time out on Tuesday at Wrigley Field against the Milwaukee Brewers, Brown allowed three runs, seven hits and two walks with six strikeouts across five innings in a 5-2 loss. Prior to that, Brown twirled four scoreless frames with one hit allowed and one walk with seven strikeouts in a 65-pitch effort.
Brown has managed 40 strikeouts across just 38.2 innings across three starts and 12 relief appearances. Facing the free-swinging Pirates, who are second in the Majors with 494 strikeouts across 53 games (9.32 strikeouts per game), should get him to at least a half-dozen punchouts for a third straight outing, even if he goes just four or five frames.
Shane McClanahan Over 6.5 Strikeouts (+126)
In another matinee game on Memorial Day, Shane McClanahan and the Rays meet Baltimore in a series opener on Monday in Oriole Park at Camden Yards at 1:35 p.m. ET.
The Orioles have the third-most strikeouts in the Majors, and second-most in the American League. That should be music to McClanahan’s and his potential prop bettors’ ears. They’ve whiffed 489 times through 53 games (9.23 strikeouts per game).
McClanahan takes the mound with 47 strikeouts across 44.2 innings in his nine starts, while posting a 5-2 record, 2.82 ERA and 1.05 WHIP. Honestly, he has All-Star-caliber numbers, but he has mostly flown under the radar.
McClanahan struck out six Orioles at Tropicana Field across five innings last time out on May 18th. He has four or more strikeouts in all nine of his outings, and he has reached seven strikeouts twice in his past five starts. There is risk here, yes, but it’s a value play at plus-money.
Luis Arraez 2+ Hits + Runs + RBIs (-141)
The Arizona Diamondbacks travel to meet the San Francisco Giants on Monday night at Oracle Park. The Diamondbacks turn to righty Merrill Kelly, looking to get the Diamondbacks off on the right foot.
The current assortment of Giants have hit .290 (27-for-93) with eight doubles, a triple, five homers and 13 RBI, while posting a .559 slugging rate and .872 OPS against Kelly.
One of the biggest pitfalls for Kelly is Willy Adames, who is hitting .286 (8-for-28) with a double, two homers and three RBI, but he also has 12 strikeouts. As such, we’ll roll with Luis Arraez instead.
Arraez is 6-for-17 (.353 average) with three doubles, a triple, a home run, three RBI, one walk, an .824 slugging rate and 1.212 OPS in his career against Kelly. It’s not a huge sample size, but anything more than 10-12 at-bats starts to become a dependable trend.
Jeff McNeil 2+ Total Bases (+139)
The Seattle Mariners hit the road to meet the Athletics at Sutter Health Park in West Sacramento, California. Manager Dan Wilson is shaking things up in the rotation, turning to veteran righty Luis Castillo for Monday’s series opener, while pushing Bryce Miller back.
Jeff McNeil doesn’t have a huge history against Castillo, but he has dominated this matchup, hitting .533 (8-for-15) with two doubles, three homers, four RBI, a 1.267 slugging rate and 1.829 OPS. All it would take is one well-placed ball down the line for McNeil to hit this prop.
