FanDuel MLB Daily Picks and Pivots – July 5 Main Slate
Welcome to the Wednesday 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!
Monday’s Early winning GPP scores were below our season average as it took 238.6 FanDuel points to take down a tournament! Over the first 98 slates of the FanDuel MLB season, the average winning score to take down a GPP has been 263.4 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 98 slates of the FanDuel MLB season, the average winning score to take down a GPP has been 263.4 points.
Monday’s Early winning GPP lines essentially boiled down to three key players – two of which were featured in our Picks and Pivots column! First, Jimmy Nelson dominated the right-handed heavy Orioles bats on his way to a 55 FanDuel point performance on the back of 8 K’s over 7 innings. From a hitting perspective, our Pirates core hitter Andrew McCutchen delivered with a double dong July 4th dropping 40.4 FD points and at only 11% ownership was a key difference maker in GPP’s. The third member of the winning trio was Eric Thames who also double donged in a great spot against Ubaldo Jimenez on his way to a similar 40.4 FD point effort.
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 Pick (MAIN):
Jacob deGrom ($10,900) Initially when looking over this slate I did not think we needed to pay up at starting pitcher but after breaking down this slate with our friends at WiseTake (check it out – had a blast doing it), I am not as convinced I need to avoid the top priced arms.
My guess is the “high-priced” arm that everyone will flock to is Alex Wood ($9,400) who comes at a significant discount over deGrom, is a massive -220 total favorite over Arizona and has a slate leading 30% K rate this season. Wood literally checks all the boxes for a GPP arm and the price points is such that you can still load up on elite bats so I expect Wood will be the highest owned arm on this slate.
Is it possible then that deGrom, on the road as a slight favorite against the Washington Nationals could actually be contrarian? As I mentioned on the show with @CK_013, I do not typically want to pick on the Nationals offense but there may be some merit from a game theory perspective in locking in deGrom at reduced ownership tonight.
deGrom has put up 52 ore more FanDuel points in four straight starts and has put up 52 and 58 FanDuel points against the Nationals in his last two starts while striking out 18 batters.
The price point is high and the match-up is not one I would typically want to pay up for but there is simply not many other options I trust today and with the expectation that Alex Wood is the chalk pitcher, can we use deGrom as a more expensive GPP pivot?
Jon Gray ($6,400): If you are not paying up for deGrom (or Wood) then my recommendation is to pay all the way down at starting pitcher. Rockies hard throwing right-hander Jon Gray came off the DL for his last start in Chase Field and promptly struck out 10 Arizona batters on his way to a 52 FanDuel point performance.
The obvious caution arises with Gray having to pitch in Coors Field but the reality is Gray proved last season his stuff translates exceptionally well to the thin air as he had a 27% K rate at home allowing only 28% hard contact and 0.9 HR/9.
In his last start Gray relied heavily on his slider (32% of the time) and generated a 15.7% swinging strike rate against Arizona in an elite hitting environment and as a -160 favorite against the Reds this is a fantastic GPP spot at essentially a punt price. The fact that the Reds bats went off on Tuesday will likely keep the ownership even further diluted just one night later.
Gray has the strikeout stuff to match any other arm on this slate and the Coors Field “risk” is clearly priced in here so I think he is worth rolling the dice on as by locking him in you can allot nearly $3,600 per batter when building the rest of your lineup.
FanDuel MLB – Top Hitting Stacks (MAIN):
To Coors or Not to Coors: The Rockies have a 6 run projected total and the Reds have a 5.46 run total so the obvious question is whether or not we need to pay the freight for Coors Field bats. I have already mentioned my love for Jon Gray so I will likely not be going towards the Reds bats but the Rockies bats against Scott Feldman can certainly be employed today. The reality is however we have nine teams with projected run totals of 5 or more so this is a spot where I think we can pivot away from Coors entirely.
Texas Rangers versus Doug Fister: The Red Sox/Rangers game has a projected run total just a half run lower than Coors Field and the Rangers specifically have a 5.55 run total which is the second highest on the slate. My gut reaction was to look towards the Red Sox bats against Andrew Cashner but the truth is, this is a guy who simply does not get rocked and limits the home run ball which when combined with the Red Sox propensity to single/double their way to run, I am finding myself less interested.
Fister on the other hand over the last two seasons is giving up a 1.87 HR/9 to left-handed hitters with a massive 37.5% hard contact rate so stacking the Rangers power lefties may be the way to go here! Nomar Mazara ($3,200), Shin-soo Choo ($3,000) and Joey Gallo ($2,800) are all priced incredibly reasonably for this match-up and allow you to not only get exposure to a Coors-like match-up but give you the salary relief to pay up for a high-end arm!
Minnesota Twins versus Parker Bridwell: The Twins have a 5 projected run total and this Twins/Angels game comes in with one of the higher game totals (opened at 10) on the board but I suspect it will be largely over-looked.
Bridwell so far in his short major league career has given up 2.6 HR/9 to hitters from both sides of the plate giving up 34% hard contact to LHB and a massive 47.2% rate to right-handed bats. Bridwell has given up 2 home runs in three of the five games he has started so a mini-Twins power stack is certainly viable and that will always start with Brian Dozier ($3,200) and Miguel Sano ($3,700).
FanDuel MLB – Sample GPP Line-Up and Slate Overview:
P: Jacob deGrom ($10,900)
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C: Punt $2k Option
1B: Joey Gallo ($2,800)
2B: Brian Dozier ($3,200)
3B: Miguel Sano ($3,700)
SS: Elvis Andrus ($3,400)
OF: Nomar Mazara ($3,200)
OF: Shin-soo Choo ($3,000)
OF: Max Kepler ($2,600)
Slate Overview: The pitching options on this slate boil down to three choices to me – Alex Wood, Jacob deGrom or Jon Gray – but I expect Wood to be the clear chalk on this slate which has my GPP mind already looking in other directions. Although paying down to Gray lets me pick and choose whatever bats I want, the reality is that there is enough value in high upside spots like Texas and Minnesota that makes locking in deGrom a realistic possibility on this slate.
For a full game by game breakdown check out my Wednesday DFS Main Slate Breakdown with WiseTake here.
Next: DraftKings MLB Main Slate Picks
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