A baseball statistic that will delight or frighten fans of the four teams vying for a spot in the American League Conference Series: In the best-of-five postseason series, which ends in a 1-1 tie, the Game 3 winner won the series 72 percent of the time. The New York Yankees and Detroit Tigers are one step closer to the ALCS as both are heavily favored to win their current series, while the Cleveland Guardians and Kansas City Royals are in survival mode as both series enter Game 4 on Thursday.

After a fantastic 7-0 result in Game 1, the Guardians are already facing a potential loss-loss situation with two games to go. Cleveland hasn’t scored a run in 20 innings, and should they win Game 4 and play another day, they’ll be rewarded by likely facing AL Cy Young favorite Tarik Skubal again in Game 5. The Tigers’ series odds reflect the way they took control of this series in Games 2 and 3.

But this is playoff baseball: Anything is possible, and Cleveland just needs to win the game in front of them, where the odds and odds are slightly better. Ace Tanner Bibee took the mound and pitched 4.2 scoreless innings with four hits and six strikeouts in Game 1 against the Tigers.

The situation is even worse in Kansas City, where the Yankees are -550 favorites to win after Giancarlo Stanton’s Game 3 home run in the eighth. They have ace Gerrit Cole taking the mound on Thursday while the Royals start Michael Wacha. A worry for the Bronx Bombers? Aaron Judge hasn’t come to life with his bat yet, going 1-for-11 in this series. Their supporting cast was stellar compared to the Royals, but will Judge really step it up in Game 4?

Here’s a look at The Bat X’s odds and predictions for Thursday’s MLB games.

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Cleveland Guardians at Detroit Tigers – Game 4

Series odds: Tiger -375, Guardian +300

The Tigers lead the series 2-1

Game 4 Pitching Matchup: Tanner Bibee (CLE) vs. TBA (DET)

Here’s how to watch Guardians at Tigers

• Venue: Comerica Park-Detroit
• Time: 6:08 p.m. ET
• TV: TNT

New York Yankees at Kansas City Royals – Game 4

Series odds: Yankees -550; Royals +400

The Yankees lead the series 2-1

Game 4 Pitching Matchup: Gerrit Cole (NYY) vs. Michael Wacha (KC)

Here’s how to see the Yankees at the Royals

• Venue: Kauffman Stadium – Kansas City, Missouri
• Time: 8:08 p.m. ET
• TV: TBS

MLB game predictions from THE BAT X

In the tables below you’ll see details of each MLB matchup followed by lots of numbers (which are updated throughout the day):

• “money line” shows the odds of each team on BetMGM.
• “Implied profit %” is the chance a team has of winning based on these BetMGM odds.
• “THE BAT X wins %” is a team’s chance of winning based on EV Analytics predictions.
• “Cash Line” Here’s how THE BAT X would rate each team’s odds.
• “Value” is the percentage difference between the odds and our forecasts.

The higher the value percentage, the better – which you can easily see by the color coding from red (poor selection) to green (good selection).

Note: On mobile devices, you may need to scroll to view the color-coded Value column at the far right of the first set of tables.

Another note: If you see old data or the tables don’t appear, you may need to “hard refresh” this page or an ad blocker or other software is blocking the tables from loading.

(Photo by Giancarlo Stanton: Ed Zurga / Getty Images)