Price: $11,700

For Max Scherzer, this makes for two starts and two appearances in this column to open the 2019 season -- and with good reason. Ranking second in the MLB in both areas last year, Scherzer finished 2018 with a skill-interactive ERA (SIERA) of 2.71 and a strikeout rate of 34.6%. That gives him a SIERA better than 3.00 or a strikeout rate better than 30% in each of the last six seasons, hitting both of those marks in three of his last four.

He lived up to those lofty standards in his first start of 2019, too, fanning 12 and allowing only 2 hits in 7 2/3 innings.

Tonight, the Washington Nationals are the biggest favorites (-210 moneyline) on the slate, leaving the Philadelphia Phillies with the only implied total below three runs (2.94).

With elite strikeout numbers and those favorable betting lines, it's no surprise to see him as our models' top-projected pitcher for Tuesday's slate.