Hey everyone CeeGee here again to break down my favorite stacks for today’s MLB EARLY Slate. If you have any questions hit my up in the DFS Army VIP Slack chat @CeeGee and we can chat. If you decide to sign up here at the DFS Army make sure you use my coupon code CEEGEE and you’ll save 10% on your membership. If you sign up today your price will never go up so get on board ASAP!
If you have played MLB DFS in the past you probably know stacking is a near MUST if you want to give yourself a chance to take down a Large Field GPP. If you’re new to MLB DFS well, now you know, STACK to win GPPs!!! There really is no other way increase your upside (and your downside) more than stacking. With that in mind I’ll do my very best to point in the right direction each day with my favorite MLB Top Stacks on Fanduel and Draftkings.
Since I’ve been with the DFS Army I’ve be utilizing the Domination Station aka the “DS” to run my 150 lineups daily in NBA and now in MLB. I’m hoping you’ll find my Stack Picks useful each day and use them in combination with the the settings within the DS. With the like, love, adore, dislike, hate and enrage (along with Lock and Exclude) features you can completely customize your player pool so that its truly unique. If you want some more info on the Domination Station check Kevin’s Domination Station MLB Tutorial HERE.
Before we get started, lets talk about the Types of stacks we have in MLB. First and foremost we have to understand that no matter how perfect a matchup looks on paper MLB is a fail first sport, meaning, even the best batters will fail nearly 70% of the time. Mike Trout (lefty masher) vs John Dank (slow pitch lefty) is a perfect matchup for Trout, but he can (and will) go 0-4 in that matchup more times that the numbers “that day” would lead you to believe. Knowing this, we can’t go “all in” on any 1 stack or 1 value stack for the day. I suggest about 30% to 35% max for teams you want to stack each day. 30% across 150 lineups would give you 45 lineups maximum on that single team. If you want exposure to more teams, drop that number to 20% – 25%
Types of Stacks
4-4 – this gives you 4 players from 1 team and 4 players from another. This gives you the highest upside and high downside
(note this Season Fanduel added the SP option to this stack so you can have 4 bats and 1 SP, last year you could only have 4 total players from 1 team)
4-3-1 – this stack is my favorite because it gives me the ability to snag a superstar “one off” player.
Example, Mike Trout, Bryce Harper as one off bats with my Red Sox / Padres (4×3) stack
3-3-1-1 – Similar to 4-3-1 but this stack gives you 2 “one off” batters. I’m not a huge fan of this as I feel like only having 3 bats from 1 team lowers my upside overall
In my article I’m not going to specify which stack you should or should not use. I’ll may mention from time to time “I am playing all 4 of these guys” or something like that. However I recommend you dig into the MLB Research Staion every day and combine that info with the tools of the MLB Domination Station along with this articles and stack as you see fit.
One final note before I get into today’s top stacks. I wanna give a huge shoutout to DFS Army Member Nadesify for taking down a cool $5,000 Monday night on Fanduel. Austin used my favorite 4-3-1 stack strategy to take this down Monday and he is just the most recent of 100’s of DFS Army members to take down big wins in the past few months. Check out our Wall of Wins for some of the rest and make sure you get on board sooner rather than later today. Use promo code CEEGEE to Save 10% on your membership and lock in your price forever!
NOTE #1 stacks article is written early in the day so projected lineups are based on the lineup each team usually has vs the handedness of today’s opposing SP
NOTE #2 I will very rarely write up Stacks in Coors Field (Colorado) and stacks in Wrigley (Chicago) with the wind blowing OUT… Simply because it would be a waste of time for me to tell you what everyone else that day is already telling you… I will tell you this however, In Coors (generally) both teams are fully stackable every single night… And in Wrigley (Chicago) with the wind blowing OUT both teams are fully stackable
My Favorite Stacks Today (EARLY)
Only a 5 Game slate, these stacks may be a little chalky but some of them you really can’t pass up
Cardinals vs White Sox Lucas Giolito (R)
Matt Carpenter, Tommy Pham, Marcell Ozuna, Yadi Molina
Total Cost $13.4k
Order 1-2-4-5 (projected)
Total DFSA Grade 329.5
Seems like we’re stacking the Cardinals every day recently. Results to this point have been hit or miss, no pun intended. This afternoon they get another prime matchup vs the White Sox Lucas Giolito. The right hander throws his 90-92 mph fastball about 52% of the time and there are several players in the Cardinals lineup that handle this speed very well. I think Giolito would be wise to mix it up more today but I don’t think he will be able to mix it up enough.
Cardinals vs Fastball between 90-93 mph
Matt Carpenter 474 woba 302 iso 45% hard contact
Marcell Ozuna 474 woba 398 iso 44% hard contact
Yadi Molina 424 woba 327 iso 44% hard contact
If Giolito doesn’t mix his pitches up to get the Cardinals hitters off his pedestrian fastball it could be an early afternoon for him.
He throws a Change up as well, but only 17% of the time. Tommy Pham, Jose Martinez and Paul Dejong all handle change ups well all with 360+ woba. Pham and DeJong have shown a little more power vs the change with 241 and 268 iso respectively
Overall the Cardinals lineup is loaded with hitters that hit the pitches Giolito throws which will make them a good team to target this afternoon.
Red Sox vs Royals Danny Duffy (L)
Mookie Betts, Hanley Ramirez, JD Martinez (only 3 expensive would like 4 but very expensive)
Total Cost $13.4k
Order 1-3-4 (projected)
Total DFSA Grade 266.6
Its hard to fully stack the Red Sox as they are just so expensive day in and day out. Their prices are justified however and today vs Danny Duffy they’ve got an ELITE matchup. They will be a very popular stack on the Early Slate.
Duffy is much better vs left handed batters than he is vs right handed batters. 216 woba .074 to lefties vs 336 woba and 173 iso to righties. Duffy mixes up his pitches well so targeting him is not necessarily about him being a bad pitcher its more about the talent of this Red Sox lineup. Duffy throws four pitches about 25% of the time. Fastball 92-94, Slider, Change, Sinker. Mookie Betts (who is expected to return today) and Hanley Ramirez are the two best hitters vs the Fastball. 401 and 396 woba to go with 285 and 214 iso. JD Martinez is not “bad” vs the fastball at that speed he just doesn’t quite qualify for the 400/200 woba/iso split I look for in these matchups. Hanley Ramirez also crushes changeups (407 woba and 235 iso) so he’s got about 50% of the pitches Duffy throws covered pretty well.
The pitch JD Martinez really crushes is the Sinker, with sky high woba of 455 and iso of 289 to go with a 42% hard contact rate. It would be wise for Duffy to avoid throwing this pitch to JD. Martinez is also the #2 overall ranked player on the Early Slate on our MLB Research Staion so he is in play for sure
I think the Red Sox will be a popular stack this afternoon but as I said I don’t think many people will want to sacrifice pitching to fit all these expensive bats. I’ll personally probably be paying up for Pitching like I normally do and pick and choosing a few one offs from these expensive lineups
Indians vs Rangers Matt Moore (L)
Fransisco Lindor, Jason Kipnis, Michael Brantley, Yan Gomes + Edwin Encarnacion + Jose Ramirez
Total Cost $13.8k
Order 1-2-4-7 (projected)
Total DFSA Grade 328.1
The whole Indians lineup is in consideration on this Early slate vs Matt Moore a reverse splits lefty who gives up a 430 woba and 234 iso to left handed batters. Moore throws his Fastball 90-92 a little over 50% of the time. Francisco Lindor, Jason Kipnis, Jose Ramirez and Edwin Encarnacion all have a 400+ woba and 200+ iso vs this Fastball speed. Matt Moore allows a a 393 woba 237 iso and 41% hard contact when he throws this pitch. Honestly, I’m not sure why he throws it at all with those types of numbers.
A sneaky play for the Indians could be Brandon Guyer, who is a real good hitter vs left handed pitchers and he handles Moore’s 2nd favorite pitch (Curveball) very well with a 372 woba and 182 iso. He may be someone you could sneak in as possibly the 4th Indian on your stack if you’re looking for a salary saver this afternoon.
To summarize, the whole Indians lineup is basically in play, fit as many as you can.
My Favorite Sneaky Stack (EARLY)
Royals @ Red Sox Drew Pomeranz
Jorge Soler, Whit Merrifield, Salvador Perez, Cheslor Cuthbert + Mike Moustakas
Total Cost $12.4k
Order 2-4-5-7 (projected)
Total DFSA Grade 318.1
Nobody likes to stack the Kansas City Royals, they just aren’t a very explosive Offense so this is a little off the wall stack for the early slate. I always want to target hitters who do well vs the types of pitches the Opp SP throws. While most people are looking at the standard vs Left or vs Right numbers I feel like this is where we can gain an edge, by looking beyond those numbers.
Looking at Drew Pomeranz he’s not a terrible pitcher he’s just about average, but he’s suseptible to the long ball from Right handed hitters giving up a 165 iso to righties vs only a 109 iso to lefties. Two guys that I’ll be targeting most from the Royals are Jorge Soler and Whit Merrifield, I know I know, not sexy household names but these guy are in a good situation today. Against Fastballs 91-93 mph, which Pomeranz throws 56% of the time both of these players have woba and iso numbers over the 400/200 threshold we look for. Soler 400/277 and Merrifield 408/261. Lucas Duda actually destroys this speed of a Fastball 469 woba 380 iso but the problem is he’s terrible vs Left Handed pitchers so he would be a pure One Off play for me. Salvador Perez just recently came back from the DL but historically he’s been a lefty masher so I think he’s in a good spot here as well. Against this fastball speed he holds a 420 woba and 244 iso so if he’s in the lineup he’s in play for sure.
If you’re feeling frisky early this afternoon throw a few Royals stacks in some cheap GPP’s while everyone else is stacking Boston, Cleveland, you could get a big jump if the Royals put up a few crooked numbers.
Other Stacks
Blue Jays @ Twins Fernando Romero
Granderson, Hernandez, Smoak, Pillar
Order 1-2-3-5
Twins vs Blue Marcus Stroman
Rossario, Kepler, Grossman, Morrison
Order 3-5-6-7
Thanks for taking the time to check out the article. If you’re in the slack chat, hit me up with any questions @CeeGee
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