Baseball on the weekends is glorious. As a family man, I don’t have the energy or the drive to have any fun of any kind by the time the weekend rolls around. I just want to be boring and lame and I am not ashamed to admit it. I am sure you have heard of the term “Weekend Warrior”. For me, it has a different meaning these days. Being able to juggle the demands of life throughout the week and still have the dedication to remain prosperous in MLB DFS is my battle. For my fellow dedicated DFS players, this article is for you.
- Main Slate Musings
Sunday has a nice ten game slate where you have a bevy of choices but not an overwhelming amount of decisions to be made like we had on Friday with the large 15 game slate. There is really only one pitcher I want to use and feel comfortable about but the main issue is that he’s so expensive that it is actually pretty difficult to create a solid roster. He is still the 100% cash play of the day and let’s go ahead and break down the pitching landscape first.
- Pitching
Corey Kluber has proven time and time again that he has just as high of a ceiling as anybody in the league, fantasy wise. In eight out of his last ten starts, Kluber has scored 49 or more Fanduel points. He has had a few ridiculous scores consisting of 70, 64, 67 and 72 (last game vs Toronto) fantasy point totals during those ten games. In seven of his last eight starts, he has 10 or more strikeouts with a season high of 14 (last game vs Toronto) during that game span. He has a fantastic floor and a phenomenal ceiling. When I look for pitchers I attempt to find a pitcher who offers safety with a ceiling. Rarely will I take a pitcher that has one without the other. Out of all the available pitching options, there are a few guys who are borderline for that criteria, but most of them fall short in one of the two categories. Kluber happens to fulfill each requirement for me and I am locking him in.
If you want a GPP pitcher I don’t know what to tell you, good luck they all are terrible. I kid, I kid! Well, I am kind of joking. I am not a fan of many of the pitchers but if forced to pick someone I would go with Adalberto Mejia (L) of the Minnesota Twins against the Oakland Athletics.
Over his last three starts, Mejia has allowed an average hard hit rate of 31% with an opponent batted ball distance of 218 feet. He has scored 25 or more Fanduel points over his last six starts with a range of 25-37 points. The Athletics have a .203 wOBA and .123 ISO with a ridiculously poor 31.9% strikeout rate against left-handed pitchers this season. He is seemingly an average at best option in a solid match-up.
***I’ll discuss in Slack what I think about Kevin Gausman and Zack Greinke. If you’re interested in joining the best community in DFS go ahead and do yourself a favor and click the link below. No, seriously you have to sign up. Nearly 1,500 messages in Slack daily between staff and members. SO MUCH EXTRA ANALYSIS. That’s on top of our optimization tool, analytics corner sheets, and lineups page detailing recent trends for the daily matchups.***
Join the DFS Army with my 20% off promo code: DONUTS
- Stacks
The Baltimore Orioles have a Vegas implied run total (IRT) of 6.1 runs. They get to face Austin Bibens-Drikx (R) who is making a spot start for the Rangers. Their run total is pretty high and rightfully so. Dirkx has been hit hard in the month of July for a 57% hard hit rate while only throwing strikes 55% of the time.
Against right-handed pitchers, the Orioles have a .317 wOBA with a .144 ISO in the month of July. If we dig deeper we find that the O’s are doing much better after the All-Star break. Since the break, they have had a .352 wOBA (8th) and a .174 ISO (15th). They have a .292 AVG which is the fourth best average using our sample size.
Adam Jones hits the slider better than any other pitch thrown to him over the past month by a right-handed pitcher. Dirkx has thrown the slider 32% of the time to righties in July. Jones’ second and third best pitches that he hits are the curve and changeup, which combined with the slider, Dirkx has thrown 58.91% of the time this month.
Jonathan Schoop has scored double digit Fanduel points in eight out of his last 10 games and has home runs in five of them. He’s a fantastic cash game play and is a mortal lock barring some unforeseen value that opens up.
My last two plays might end up being my favorite plays in the Orioles lineup. Seth Smith has a .381 wOBA with a .265 ISO and a 33% flyball rate in July. Chris Davis has a .373 wOBA and .290 ISO with a 30% flyball rate. His 32.4% K rate against righties this month has ruined him. The good thing is that Dirkx only strikes out 6.3% of lefties on the season and has given up a flyball rate of 40.3%. Not having to worry about these two lefties striking out? Yes, please!
I am not a fan of stacking the Chicago Cubs but I would be remiss if I didn’t mention them today. They face off with Junior Guerra in Milwaukee and have an IRT of 5.8 runs. Junior has had trouble finding the strike zone this season as only 58% of his pitches are thrown for strikes (56% in July). He walks three or four batters per game and has given up a home run in 11 of 13 starts this season. He hasn’t made it past 5.2 innings in the last five games because of his control issues and home runs. The Cubs could go nuts today. Guerra struggles against both sides of the plate but most recently has been dominated by lefties so that will be our main approach today. We want the most optimal lineup choices, not just the good ones.
Against righties in July, Anthony Rizzo has a .404 wOBA and .308 ISO with a 37.5% flyball rate. Guerra has a massive 43.5% fly ball rate against lefties this month.My arch nemesis, Kyle Schwarber has a .405
My arch nemesis, Kyle Schwarber has a .405 wOBA and .350 ISO against righties in the last month and is really heating up at the plate. He had a huge game on Thursday and likely will have elevated ownership at an increased salary price point. Normally two reasons to fade a volatile player have come to fruition. For this reason, he should only be used as part of a Cubs stack and not a one-off.
Lastly, I want to have Wilson Contreras at catcher. The catcher position often leaves us wanting more but not Contreras as of late. In the past month, he has a .400 wOBA and .281 ISO against righties. On top of that, he hits the splitter well which is Guerra’s second most use pitch against righties in July (31.73% of the time).
Join the DFS Army with my 20% off promo code: “WIN” which will give you a one-week FREE trial
The Cleveland Indians are in a sneaky spot today as they will be overshadowed by several other offenses with higher IRTs. They face off with Miguel Gonzalez (R) for the White Sox. Gonzalez has been boom or bust this season in every single start. He either gets shelled and knocked out of the game prior to the third or fourth inning or gets a quality start.
The Indians have some hitters who are very good against righties and they are all seemingly heating up at the plate again. Although his price has jumped up enormously over the past week, Bradley Zimmer has to be included in our stack. I mentioned twice this week in our Slack chat to our members only, that whenever Zimmer faces a pitcher who relies on off-speed pitches heavily, specifically the slider and curve, to make sure to lock him in. He belted a home run in each of those games. Gonzalez throws the curve and slider a combined 42.24% of the time to lefties in the past month. Welcome to my lineup, Zimmer.
In the month of July, Michael Brantley has a 40.0% hard hit rate with a .310 AVG and a .369 wOBA against righties. He has belted two home runs and ten RBI while going 14-for-51 since the All-Star break.
Jose Ramirez looks like he’s going to go on another ridiculous hot streak again as he has four multi-hit games and has gone 12-for-37 since the All-Star break. He had four hits in Friday’s game and will likely carry heavy ownership. I would only use him as part of an Indians full stack but not as a mini-stack or one-off because of the elevated ownership. *We often discuss price point pivots and ownership reasoning during our many Slack chat conversations with members every day*.
My last Indian is my favorite player on possibly the entire slate. He’s underpriced for how well he is hitting, he’s cheaper than he should be, and he’s always under-owned because he has been hitting sixth in the lineup. The man is none other than Carlos Santana. He has a nice .391 wOBA and .283 ISO against righties this month and is on fire at the plate. He has four home runs over his last five games and is batting .338 for the month of July. He’s 13-for-36 in his last nine games and has an elevated exit velocity on all batted ball events since the All-Star break (+2 MPH).
Remember that there isn’t a wrong way or right way to construct a lineup until after the results are in. Whatever you do, just make sure you do it with sound research and analysis. Winning lineups may sometimes look like someone just threw darts at a board but nobody truly plays like that with money on the line. Game theory and research can be the best of friends for GPP’s.
Good luck to all of my fellow weekend warriors! You can find me on Twitter @DFSnDONUTS where I love to interact with my followers and enjoy the sweat of a big night with you.