MLB Prop Bet Data Sources: Baseball Savant, FanGraphs and Beyond
Available in US
Free Data Sources Give UK Bettors the Same Edge as US Sharps
There is a persistent myth that American bettors have an information advantage over UK punters when it comes to MLB props. It is nonsense. Every data source that a sharp bettor in New Jersey uses to evaluate a strikeout prop is accessible, free of charge, from a laptop in Birmingham or a phone on the Tube. The data is the same. The time zone is different, but the analysis is not.
When I started building my prop process, I assumed I would need expensive subscriptions and proprietary databases. What I actually needed was three free websites and the discipline to check them daily. Nine years later, those same three sites — Baseball Savant, FanGraphs and a handful of supplementary tools — remain the backbone of my research. The information asymmetry in MLB prop betting is not about access; it is about knowing what to look for and how to apply it.
Baseball Savant: Statcast Metrics and Search Tools
Baseball Savant is MLB’s official Statcast data portal, and it is the single most important resource for prop betting research. Every pitch thrown in a major-league game is tracked by high-speed cameras and radar, producing a dataset that includes pitch velocity, spin rate, movement, location, exit velocity, launch angle and sprint speed. All of it is free, searchable and updated within minutes of each game ending.
The feature I use most is the player search. Type in a pitcher’s name and you get a dashboard showing his pitch mix, velocity trends, whiff rate by pitch type, hard-hit rate against, expected ERA and a dozen other metrics. For a strikeout prop, the relevant numbers are whiff rate (the percentage of swings that miss), chase rate (the percentage of pitches outside the zone that batters swing at) and called-strike-plus-whiff rate (a composite of both). These metrics predict future strikeout performance more reliably than strikeouts per nine innings because they isolate the skill component — the pitcher’s ability to generate misses and force bad decisions — from the noise of random outcomes.
For hitter props, Savant’s batted-ball data is essential. Exit velocity, barrel rate, hard-hit rate and expected slugging tell you whether a hitter is making quality contact, regardless of what his surface-level batting average says. A hitter with elite exit velocity and a depressed batting average is often a strong candidate for total bases and hits overs, because the process data says the results are about to catch up.
The Statcast search tool is the power feature that most casual users overlook. It lets you filter by date range, opponent, pitch type, count, zone and dozens of other variables. Want to know how a specific pitcher’s slider has performed against left-handed hitters in two-strike counts over the last 30 days? That query takes ten seconds to run and returns granular data that directly informs platoon-based prop analysis.
FanGraphs: Splits, Projections and Leaderboards
If Baseball Savant is the raw data engine, FanGraphs is the analytical layer on top. The site publishes advanced metrics, projection systems, split data and leaderboards that contextualise the raw Statcast numbers and make them actionable for prop purposes.
The splits section is where I spend the most time. FanGraphs breaks every hitter’s and pitcher’s performance into home/away, left/right, monthly, situational and count-specific splits. For prop betting, the left/right splits are the most directly applicable — they tell you how a hitter performs against left-handed versus right-handed pitching, which feeds directly into platoon-adjusted prop evaluation. The monthly splits are useful for seasonal-trend analysis, showing whether a hitter’s power output is peaking in summer or declining in September.
FanGraphs also hosts multiple projection systems — ZiPS, Steamer and the in-house Depth Charts — that estimate each player’s expected performance for the remainder of the season. These projections are useful as a sanity check against your own analysis. If you project a pitcher to average 7.5 strikeouts per start but every projection system has him at 6.2, either you have found an edge the models missed or — more likely — you have overweighted a variable that the models have already accounted for.
The leaderboards allow quick filtering by stat and date range. I use them to identify which hitters currently lead the league in exit velocity, which pitchers lead in whiff rate and which teams lead in first-inning scoring — all data points that feed into daily prop selection. The date-range filter is critical: season-long leaderboards tell you about overall talent, but a rolling 30-day filter tells you about current form, which is more relevant for tonight’s prop bet.
Other Useful Sources: Brooks Baseball, Umpire Scorecards, Weather APIs
Beyond the two primary platforms, a handful of niche tools fill specific gaps in the research process.
Brooks Baseball specialises in pitch-movement data, offering visualisations of how each pitcher’s arsenal moves compared to the league average. The site is particularly useful for identifying pitchers whose pitch movement has changed — a slider that has gained two inches of horizontal sweep, or a fastball that has lost a tick of velocity. These changes often precede shifts in strikeout and contact rates that prop lines have not yet absorbed.
Umpire Scorecards grades every home-plate umpire after each game, publishing zone-size estimates, accuracy percentages and consistency scores. Since the umpire assignment is typically announced one to two days before a game, you have time to check the assigned umpire’s tendencies and adjust your strikeout, walk and earned-run prop evaluations accordingly.
Weather data is available through any standard forecast service, but the most useful format for prop purposes is a site that provides hourly wind speed and direction at the ballpark location. Checking wind direction at game time — specifically whether it is blowing out to the outfield or in from the outfield — takes two minutes and directly affects home run and total bases prop expectations, particularly at open-air parks.
For roster and lineup information, beat reporters on social media remain the fastest source. Lineup cards are typically posted 90 minutes before first pitch, and beat reporters for each team publish them immediately. Knowing the exact batting order is essential for evaluating hitter props, because lineup position determines plate-appearance volume and, by extension, the expected statistical output that drives the prop line.
The total research time for a well-structured daily prop process — checking Savant for pitcher and hitter metrics, FanGraphs for splits and projections, Umpire Scorecards for the umpire assignment, weather for wind and temperature, and beat reporters for lineup confirmation — is 30-45 minutes. That investment is the same whether you are in New York or Newcastle, and the data advantage it produces is the same as well. The tools are free, the information is public, and the only barrier is the willingness to do the work before placing a bet on any prop market.
Is Baseball Savant data free to access from the UK?
Yes. Baseball Savant is MLB’s official Statcast data platform and is entirely free to access from any location, including the UK. No subscription or account is required. The site provides pitch-tracking data, batted-ball metrics, player dashboards and a customisable search tool that covers every pitch thrown in the major leagues.
Which FanGraphs metrics are most useful for MLB prop research?
For pitcher props, whiff rate, chase rate and FIP are the most directly applicable metrics. For hitter props, wRC+ by handedness, hard-hit rate and expected slugging provide the clearest picture of true offensive quality. The splits section — particularly left/right and monthly breakdowns — is essential for platoon-adjusted prop evaluation. The date-range filter on leaderboards helps identify current form rather than season-long averages.
Prepared by the mlb bet Props editorial staff.
