FanDuel MLB Daily Picks and Pivots – June 17
Welcome to the Saturday FanDuel MLB edition of Picks and Pivots, a fantasy baseball column focused on helping you find the best core lineup for today’s Early slate which kicks off at 4:05 PM 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!
Friday’s Main winning GPP scores were right above our season average as it took 264 FanDuel points to take down a tournament! Over the first 80 slates of the FanDuel MLB season, the average winning score to take down a GPP has been 262.1 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 80 slates of the FanDuel MLB season, the average winning score to take down a GPP has been 262.1 points.
Friday’s winning GPP roster was built around a surprising offensive stack as the Chicago White Sox erupted for 11 runs against Toronto and paired with the Rangers bats who went off for 10 runs of their own, those offenses alone went for over 200 FanDuel points! At pitcher, Carlos Martinez who was only 7% owned, struck out 8 batters in 6 innings and put up 49 FanDuel points against the Orioles!
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 Pitcher Picks:
Masahiro Tanaka ($8,400): Will the real Masahiro Tanaka please stand up? The Yankee right-hander has become the definition of a GPP pitcher this season putting up game logs that range from tournament winning to tournament sinking!
Over his last four starts, Tanaka has put up 62, 45, 8 and 6 points, a perfect representation of the range of outcomes we seem to get from Tanaka this year!
Today, Tanaka and the Yankees take on a Oakland Athletics team that he just dominated in Yankee Stadium with 13 K’s and 62 FanDuel points! The A’s have the second lowest projected run total on the slate (behind the Mets against Strasburg) and the third highest K rate (24.5%) against right-handed pitchers this season.
Digging into the last four games a bit more, there is a clear difference in approach from Tanaka in the two games he dominated versus the games he got lit up – his pitch selection. In the two elite starts, Tanaka threw only 18% fastballs with 34% sliders which generated a dominant 18% swinging strike rate. In the two starts he got blasted, the swinging strike rate plummeted to 6% as a result in his reliance on the fastball (27%) and a decreased ability to throw his slider (26%).
His signature pitch, the splitter, was maybe the most glaring difference has he threw it 34% of the time in his two great starts versus only 23% in his single digit outings.
So what does this all mean – if Tanaka has his nasty splitter/slider combo then he is going to dominate but if he has to rely on a 91 MPH fastball then he is going to get shelled. The clear difference in approach shows that there is reason for optimism but also significant risk which makes him the perfect GPP arm to build around today!
Since Tanaka is not an “All-In” arm, we are going to need a pivot off him if building line-ups and in that case I will move to Zack Godley ($7,800) against the Phillies in Citizens Bank Park. There are a handful of metrics that I look towards when trying to find my DFS SP each day including swinging strike rate and ground ball rate as it helps me uncover pitchers who are able to limit the damage on batted balls but still have the K upside we need in GPP’s. On today’s slate no pitcher has a higher swinging strike rate (13.1%) or ground ball rate (61.6%) than Godley who has 30 or more FanDuel points in five of his seven starts this year and 40 or more in three of those starts this season.
Godley does not have the 10k upside of a pitcher like Tanaka but his ability to limit hard contact (29%) and his elite ground ball rate means he is much more likely to limit the opposing team’s run production while still giving us 6-7 strikeout upside.
I think the Early Slate is one where we can comfortably fade the Stephen Strasburg/Chris Archer tier in GPP’s and pay down to arms like Tanaka/Godley for a fraction of the ownership that allows us a completely different roster build.
FanDuel MLB: Top Hitting Stacks:
Milwaukee Brewers versus Dinelson Lamet: The Brewers bats were one of my core stacks on Friday night ans they did not disappoint as Eric Thames, Travis Shaw and Manny Pina all came through with home runs!
Today, the Brew Crew has the highest implied team total (5.35) of any team on the Early Slate and will face off with a pitcher in Dinelson Lamet who has given up 7 ER in each of his last two starts. Digging in further, Lamet has a ridiculous 4.35 HR/9 to left-handed batters this season with a 56% fly ball rate and 40.6% hard contact rate. Apply those metrics to a ball park like Miller Park and mix in the fact that the Brewers are loaded with left-handed power and you can see why Vegas loves them!
Eric Thames ($3,600) is back to mashing baseballs with home runs in three straight games and can be paired with Travis Shaw ($3,800) and The Nerd, Eric Sogard ($3,400) for a full on left-handed top of the order Brewers stack!
Los Angeles Dodgers versus Asher Wojciechiowski: Although we hit on the Brewers on Friday Night, the Dodgers bats were a big time flop in Great American Ballpark however we should not be afraid to go back to them today!
Woj is a massive fly ball pitcher with a 60% fly ball rate to left-handed batters and with a 5.06 implied run total, Vegas expects a similar bounce back performance. Digging into the RotoGrinders Plate IQ tool you can see that Woj relies on his fastball/slider combination which aligns perfectly with the Dodgers ability to hit that pitch at an above league average rate.
Corey Seager ($3,500), Cody Bellinger ($3,900), Chris Taylor ($3,300) and Joc Pederson ($2,900) are my top four targets here and my hope is that the masses who got burned Friday night leave them under-owned in a great spot today!
FanDuel MLB – Sample GPP line-up and Slate Overview:
P: Masahiro Tanaka ($8,400)
C: $2-2.2K punt
1B: Eric Thames ($3,600)
2B: Eric Sogard ($3,400)
3B: Travis Shaw ($3,800)
SS: Corey Seager ($3,500)
OF: Cody Bellinger ($3,900)
OF: Chris Taylor ($3,300)
OF: Joc Pederson ($2,900)
Next: Fantasy Football Top 20 Dynasty Player Rankings
Best of luck in your FanDuel MLB contests and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR on Twitter for all the late breaking line-up news and roster updates!