Welcome to the Friday FanDuel MLB edition of Picks and Pivots, a fantasy baseball column focused on helping you find the best core lineup for today’s Main slate which kicks off at 7:05PM EST!
For those of you finding us for the first time, the concept behind FanDuel MLB Picks and Pivots is to first identify key building blocks that can be used for any roster construction and then identify pivot points to help differentiate your lineup in hopes of a big payday!
Thursday’s winning GPP scores continued below our season average as it took 240.7 FanDuel points to take down a tournament! Over the first 51 slates of the FanDuel MLB season, the average winning score to take down a GPP has been 256.9 points. Looking back at last season, the winning GPP lineup on average scored 255 FanDuel points with a typical roster build that allocated 25% of your salary cap to your SP and the remaining 75% to your hitters.
Over the first 51 slates of the FanDuel MLB season, the average winning score to take down a GPP has been 256.9 points.
Thursday’s Picks and Pivots lines were mixed results as our Early Slate was a bit hit while the Main Slate was, well to put it kindly, quite ugly. The Early Slate picks were centered around the Cubs/Reds game stack which came through in a big way and we avoided the Tanner Roark/Ervin Santana chalk which put us in position to cash across the board.
The Main Slate was not nearly as forgiving as we opted to punt with with pitchers making their MLB debut as a starter and well, sometimes there is a reason they are priced as low as they are! Our high-priced bats in LA/Miami/Seattle failed to come through which left us with an all around low score and our lack of Toronto exposure left us well behind the pack.
Each day we will break down our top Starting Pitcher and our top hitting stacks of the day while giving you our thoughts on roster build and lineup construction.
As always, we will look to update our picks and final lineup thought prior to lock on our twitter account @FantasyCPR so make sure to give us a follow for all the late breaking lineup news.
Without further ado, let’s get into today’s slate!
FanDuel MLB – Top Starting Pitching Picks:
Chris Sale ($12,000): After a day of brutal starting pitching we get a great Main Slate with 4-5 legit top end arms we can opt to pay up for. With Jacob deGrom at home, Luis Severino against a Tampa team he already beat with 11K’s, Picks and Pivots favorite Charlie Morton and Alex Wood coming off back to back 10k+ performances – we have a plethora of options to choose from.
All these options are frankly distractions though from the clear top price at starting pitcher as Red Sox ace, Chris Sale, will take the mound in Oakland. Sale comes into this game with seven straight double-digit strikeout performances and 50+ FanDuel points in six of his last seven outings.
The A’s are a team that strikes out the fifth most in baseball against left-handed pitching and with Yonder Alonso out with an injury, the Oakland line-up looks to be one we can exploit especially in a pitching friendly ballpark!
The price is high on sale at $12k as rostering him allows you only $2.8k per hitter but the upside here is simply too good to pass up. As mentioned there are a handful of legit tournament pivots which actually may work in our favor as the ownership is slightly lowered on Sale and with no “must-have” hitting spots, I think we can get enough value in our line-ups to fit in the top end arm on this slate!
FanDuel MLB – Top Hitting Stacks:
J.D. Martinez ($4,000)/Chris Davis ($3,700): Looking over this slate I actually think building full on stacks is the wrong approach as we have no exceptionally high team totals and it may be better to pick some one-off hitters to anchor your line-up.
There are two hitters that jump off the plate to me and will be at the core of my Picks and Pivots line-ups today. J.D. Martinez ($4,000) is absolutely red-hot with five home runs and 11 RBI’s in his first six games of the season and faces off with Nick Martinez who is giving up 2 HR/9 this season. Chris Davis ($3,700) is my BvP lock of the day facing off against Aaron Sanchez in Camden Yards with career marks of 8 hits in 18 at bats with 4 home runs!
Dodgers RHB versus Justin Nicolino: The issue with locking in Sale and the two high-priced bats above is that it only leaves you $2.5k to fill out the rest of your roster and this is where the Dodgers stack comes into play!
With Justin Turner leaving last night’s game with a hamstring injury and a left-hander on the mound, the Dodgers will throw out their usual right-handed heavy line-up which is where the best price points sit on this team!
Chris Taylor ($2,900) will likely be in the lead-off spot and followed by Franklin Gutierrez ($2,700), Kike Hernandez ($2,800) and Yasiel Puig ($2,700). Austin Barnes ($2,200) will likely slot into the catcher spot today and should bat 6th which makes him an elite punt option on a day we need some value!
Nicolino in his career gives up a 31% hard-contact rate to RHB and the Dodgers come into this game with the highest team total on the board. The right-handed heavy line-up has the perfect amount of value for a Sale based roster and will be at the core of my roster build today!
Luis Valbuena/Andrelton Simmons versus Jacob deGrom: Stacking against Jacob deGrom, especially in Citi Field, is not something I would normally advocate but for anyone watching deGrom pitch this year they can see he is simply not sharp.
deGrom has given up at least 3 ER in each of his last five starts and is giving up 37% hard contact which is a 10% increase over his elite 2015 numbers. Luis Valbuena ($2,200) and Andrelton Simmons ($2,600) will likely bat 4th and 5th in the Angels line-up tonight and with the name recognition of deGrom will surely be over-looked as a cheap mini-stack!
FanDuel MLB – Top GPP line-up and Slate Overview:
P: Chris Sale ($12,000)
More from FanSided
- USMNT news: Turner to Forest, Trusty to Sheffield, Reynolds to Westerlo
- Inside the Clubhouse: What I’m hearing as the MLB Trade Deadline nears
- Yankees: Luis Severino has blunt assessment of another miserable outing
- Bills: 3 2023 roster holes that could cost Josh Allen a Super Bowl
- Colts RB Jonathan Taylor shoots down rumors of troubling injury
C: Austin Barnes ($2,200)
1B: Chris Davis ($3,700)
2B: Chris Taylor ($2,900)
3B: Luis Valbuena ($2,200)
SS: Andrelton Simmons ($2,600)
OF: J.D. Martinez ($4,000)
OF: Yasiel Puig ($2,700)
OF: Franklin Gutierrez ($2,700)
Slate Overview: We finally get a slate with a handful of top end starting pitching options so this is certainly a spot to pay up tonight but FanDuel’s pricing for bats will make it a challenge to do so! The Dodgers are my absolute favorite way to target the top offense on the board with cost-effective plays that allow you to lock in a guy like Chris Sale and if you can get two big power bats like Martinez/Davis in your line-up to boot you set yourself up with a great GPP foundation!
Best of luck in your FanDuel MLB contests and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR on Twitter for all the latest lineup news and roster updates!