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FanDuel MLB Daily Picks and Pivots – Saturday September 16

By Brian Tulloch

FanDuel MLB: BALTIMORE, MD - SEPTEMBER 07: Aaron Judge #99 of the New York Yankees takes the field against the Baltimore Orioles in the first inning at Oriole Park at Camden Yards on September 7, 2017 in Baltimore, Maryland. (Photo by Rob Carr/Getty Images)
FanDuel MLB: BALTIMORE, MD - SEPTEMBER 07: Aaron Judge #99 of the New York Yankees takes the field against the Baltimore Orioles in the first inning at Oriole Park at Camden Yards on September 7, 2017 in Baltimore, Maryland. (Photo by Rob Carr/Getty Images) /
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FanDuel MLB
BALTIMORE, MD – SEPTEMBER 07: Aaron Judge FanDuel MLB /

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 DFS action!

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!

PLAY FANDUEL: New users win first contest or get credited up to $120!

Friday’s winning GPP scores were below our season average as it took 237.1 FanDuel points to take down a tournament! Over the first 160 slates of the FanDuel MLB season, the average winning score to take down a GPP has been 260.4 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 160 slates of the FanDuel MLB season, the average winning score to take down a GPP has been 260.4 points.

Friday’s Main Slate winning line-ups had a variety of different roster builds from a hitting perspective but the most common theme was that it took having Robbie Ray as your starting pitcher to take down a GPP as his 10 K 58 FanDuel point outing carried many to victory. The core build of Picks and Pivots was around the Dodgers against Edwin Jackson and they scored early and often with home runs from Corey Seager, Yasiel Puig and Justin Turner on their way to a 7-0 shutout of the Nationals.

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
BALTIMORE, MD – AUGUST 21: Jonathan Schoop #6 of the Baltimore Orioles celebrates with Adam Jones #10 and Manny Machado #13 after hitting a three-run home run in the fifth inning against the Oakland Athletics at Oriole Park at Camden Yards on August 21, 2017 in Baltimore, Maryland. (Photo by Greg Fiume/Getty Images) /

FanDuel MLB: Early Slate Breakdown:

A Four Game Slate (or is it three?): Looking over the early slate that kicks off at 4PM EST, the biggest question mark in my mind as I write this early in the day is how do we treat an Indians team that is coming off their first loss in weeks? Although I have not seen anything official (but will monitor on Twitter), I would expect that Terry Francona will rest many of his starters now that the winning streak is over so this is a critical spot to keep an eye on.

The most significant impact of the Indians plans will be on starting pitcher Carlos Carrasco who is the clear-cut top arm on this slate and would be a slam dunk under normal circumstances but my fear is that we see a watered down Indians line-up and scaled back effort after their pursuit of history.

Indians Plans Decide Game Theory and Roster Build: Assuming the Indians rest their starters and we see an abbreviated outing (say 5-6 innings for Carrasco), this slate becomes wide open and sets up for a GPP only type slate as the pitching options after Carrasco are wildly underwhelming which means we need to build our core around our bats and work pitchers in after the fact!

Slugfest in the Bronx: The Yankees and Orioles game stands out with the highest projected game total (10 runs) on the Early Slate so this is a great spot for offense as Jordan Montgomery and Jeremy Hellickson take the mound.

Over the last month, Hellickson is giving up a .383 ISO and .391 wOBA to right-handed hitters so we can fire up Aaron Judge ($4,200) and Gary Sanchez ($3,700) as high upside plays on a slate where without Carrasco, we can afford to drop down at starting pitcher. The Baltimore side to me against Montgomery is where my focus will be in this game however as the price points are simply too cheap for an offense this talented!

Montgomery has not pitched more than 5 innings since July 25th so we are dealing with a pitcher on a reduced pitch count but one who has given up a .300 ISO and .387 wOBA to RHB over the last month. Jonathan Schoop ($3,300) and Manny Machado ($3,800) are lock and load plays for me on this slate as they both sport ISO’s against left-handed pitching of .440 or higher over the last month with .500 wOBA’s! Lock them in!

Ivan the Terrible: Outside of the Bronx, the Reds bats in Great American Ball Park is where I will move to next as they take on a pitcher who has given up 4+ ER in three straight starts including 5 ER in 5 innings to this same Reds team the last time in faced them on the road.

On the road this season, Nova is giving up 2.2 HR/9 to left-handed hitters with a 34% hard contact rate so firing up Joey Votto ($4,200) and Scott Schebler ($2,800) as core plays in this spot allows you to attack one of the worst arms on this early slate!

So where does this leave us at Pitcher?: If we are stacking up the bats in the Bronx and we want to utilize the Reds offense – that leaves us with two pitchers in Wrigley where the wind is blowing out to left field at 10 MPH or the unknown in Cleveland. Rather than go to those spots, I will look to target Sal Romano ($6,600) as my GPP arm against the Pirates who just gave up 41 FanDuel points to Homer Bailey last night on the back of 7 K’s!

Romano is not a high strikeout arm but he generates over a 52% ground ball rates and has limited right-handed bats to a .088 ISO over the last month while allowing 2 or fewer ER’s in four of his last five starts. The opportunity cost on this early slate is low so taking a shot on a pitcher in his home park against weak offense gives me the ability to rack up 34+ FanDuel points, a mark Romano has hit in three of his last five outings!

FanDuel MLB
CINCINNATI, OH – SEPTEMBER 15: Scott Schebler /

FanDuel MLB – Sample Line-Up and Slate Overview

Please Note: This is NOT an optimized line-up, it is simply illustrative to show the type of roster build we can have using the logic previously laid out in Picks and Pivots. My actual line-up may differ from the line-up shown here.  

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P: Sal Romano ($6,600)

C: Gary Sanchez ($3,700)

1B: Joey Votto ($4,200)

2B: Jonathan Schoop ($3,300)

3B: Manny Machado ($3,800)

SS: Tim Beckham ($3,400)

OF: Scott Schebler ($2,800)

OF: Adam Duvall ($2,700)

OF: Aaron Judge ($4,200)

Slate Overview: Assuming the Indians rest their starters, that game becomes a complete stay away for me and opens this up to be a great GPP only style slate that will allow you to load up on bats and take some shots with your starting pitcher’s that you wouldn’t normally look to roster. I will keep an eye on the Indians news and share throughout the day on Twitter which will ultimately impact how I play this slate!

Due to personal commitments I will unlikely be around the Main Slate so will look to take the night slate off and get ready for NFL tomorrow with some Week 2 Picks and Pivots! 

Next: FanDuel NFL Picks and Pivots - Week 2

Stay tuned to Fantasy CPR for all the latest DFS news and analysis as we get you set for all the MLB, EPL and NFL action for Week 2!