Fansided

FanDuel Lineup and Picks for Saturday, April 21

By Adam Strangis

DENVER, CO - APRIL 20: Kyle Schwarber
DENVER, CO - APRIL 20: Kyle Schwarber /
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Welcome into the FanDuel MLB daily fantasy column. Saturday doesn’t feature a split slate like normal but there’s a nice nine-game slate tonight.

As excited as I was for last night’s slate, it sure went into the trash can early on in the evening. One thing that’s important for the readers to know is I’ll be the first one to say I misread that slate. That’s exactly what happened last night.

We spent big bucks on Clayton Kershaw and Aaron Judge to get a whopping 24 points. The Brewers and Jean Segura were the popular plays that really hit well and did us in. What’s frustrating is if I had just pitched Justin Verlander like everyone else, I could have played Segura and we probably hit the cash line.

You can never win them all in daily fantasy, but that one was the worst slate we’ve had for at least 10 days, not counting the postponement debacle last Sunday. All we can do is  dust ourselves off and crush this nine-game slate tonight.

BOSTON, MA – APRIL 15: Chris Sale #42 of the Boston Red Sox delivers during the fourth inning of a game against the Baltimore Orioles on April 15, 2018 at Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts. (Photo by Billie Weiss/Boston Red Sox/Getty Images)
BOSTON, MA – APRIL 15: Chris Sale #42 of the Boston Red Sox delivers during the fourth inning of a game against the Baltimore Orioles on April 15, 2018 at Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts. (Photo by Billie Weiss/Boston Red Sox/Getty Images) /

Starting Pitcher, High End Spend

Chris Sale, $11,500

.216(11 for 51), 25.5 strikeout rate

The Saturday evening slate is super interesting on the pitching end of things. We have a high number of quality pitchers on the mound, but the metrics point to many of them being in a relatively bad matchup. I’m siding with Sale in this spot because he’s one of the best pitchers in baseball and he comes into the game in great form. He’s striking out over 12 batters per nine innings, his hard contact percentage is down at 20 percent and he’s limiting fly balls. The A’s have been good against lefties so far in 2018 and one other factor against Sale is pitch mix. Since the start of 2017, the A’s rank in the top 12 against the fastball, slider and changeup. That’s not ideal, but most of those pitches didn’t come from Sale. He’s still totally in play as the highest scoring pitcher of the slate.

Also Consider – Jacob DeGrom, $10,200

Mid-Range

James Paxton, $9,000

.367(22 for 60), 20.9 strikeout rate 

The Rangers are struggling on offense right now and have plenty of lefty bats in the lineup, including Joey Gallo. While Paxton hasn’t pitched well against lefties so far this year, he owned them last year when he gave up a .198 average and a .210 wOBA. He’s looked better his last two starts and even though he’s in a hitter’s park, he could be a solid way to get off the other aces on this slate. The strikeout upside is there as well. Paxton has 17 his last 12 innings pitched and Texas is striking out over 23 percent of the time.

Also Consider – Zach Godley, $9,300

Value

Even with a game at Coors Field on a smaller slate, I can’t see myself spending down at pitcher tonight. We’ll have to find our value elsewhere to make things work this evening.