MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – Sunday May 20
Welcome to the Sunday edition of MLB DFS Picks and Pivots, a fantasy baseball column focused on helping you find the best core lineup for this slate of DFS action!
For those of you finding us for the first time, the concept behind MLB DFS Picks and Pivots is to give you a first look at the day’s MLB DFS slate, including our top picks, plays and pivots, using FantasyDraft pricing as a reference, to help you build your best line-up and win big.
Picks and Pivots is not a simple “best plays” column but rather it focuses on slate strategy and roster construction to help give you insight into how I will look to play this slate.
Saturday’s MLB DFS action was headlined by strong pitching on the Main Slate as James Paxton, Max Scherzer and Jose Quintana put up three of the top four scores on the night surrounded by some big individual offensive performances by Gary Sanchez who clobbered two home runs against the Royals and Jose Abreu who paced the White Sox with a 5-3 win over the Rangers with a long ball of his own.
Picks and Pivots is not a simple “best plays” column but rather it focuses on slate strategy and roster construction to help give you insight into how I will look to play this slate. The goal of this article is to dig through the slate, highlight our top plays and help you identify the best slate strategy across your MLB DFS line-ups.
As always, we will look to update our final lineup thoughts throughout the day 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!
MLB DFS – Starting Pitcher Overview:
Even with Stephen Strasburg on the mound today there is no question in my mind that Noah Syndergaard ($19.4K) is my favorite SP1 choice as he not only gets a massive discount off Strasburg but he also faces an Arizona team that is striking out at a league leading 28.3% clip over the last two weeks.
Arizona strike out at 26% clip against RHP over the last two weeks which is the third highest mark in baseball and even though Jake Lamb is now back in the Diamondbacks line-up, this is still a projected line-up with a 24% K rate and with Thor being a -180 home favorite today he becomes a lock and load SP1 for me in all formats.
Finding an SP2 is a much tougher task on this slate and this becomes one of those instances where I am looking more at the opponents than the pitcher on the mound. Reynaldo Lopez ($13.9K) gets a home start against a Rangers team with the 4th highest K rate against RHP over the last two weeks (25.9%). Lopez has given up 2 or fewer ER in 5 of his 8 starts this season, and will take on a Rangers team that has four batters in their projected line-up with a 30% or higher K rate against RHP this season.
On one pitcher sites I see no reason to move off Syndergaard where you get the benefit of avoiding this SP2 mess and on two pitcher sites like FantasyDraft, I would simply lock in Thor, build your bats and work to retro-fit your SP2.
If you need a bit more salary savings, Jack Flaherty ($12.7K) has a 22% K rate on the season with a double-digit swinging strike rate of 11.4% in his last two seasons of MLB service. Flaherty has pitched well this season, going 5 innings per start, with a 2.87 ERA and roughly a strikeout per inning. The Phillies offense is certainly dangerous but this is also a team with K ability as the projected line-up has a 24% K rate and with the salary savings you get with Flaherty, it becomes very easy to stack up Thor with your favorite high-end bats.
MLB DFS – Hitting Overview:
There are two teams on this slate with run projections of 5 or higher as the Yankees and Braves both look to be in high upside spots against weak LHP this afternoon. The Yankees will take on LHP Eric Skoglund who has given up a 43% hard contact rate to RHB over the last two seasons which means Aaron Judge ($10.9K) and Giancarlo Stanton ($10K) become two of the top plays on the slate but do not overlook Didi Gregorious ($8.2K) as Skoglund has given up a .200 ISO to LHB this season as you will be able to differentiate your stack with the lefty/lefty match-up.
The Braves will take on LHP Wei-Yin Chen, who is giving up a massive .380 ISO to RHB this season to go along with his 39% HC rate which puts this Braves stack firmly on my radar again today. Ozzie Albies ($10.1K) has an absurd .440 ISO against LHP this season and can be paired with Ronald Acuna Jr. ($8.2K) who has a .241 ISO against LHP, making this a nice 1-2 stack at the top of the order. The nice thing about the Braves is you can mix and match some cheaper bats in like Tyler Flowers ($6.6K) who should get the start at catcher on this day game after a night game and Flowers has a .300+ ISO against LHP which gives you a nice cheap punt play with significant power upside.
With so much focus on the Mets SP, do not overlook the bats in this line-up that are starting to heat up, specifically Michael Conforto ($7.5K) who went 4 for 4 on Friday night before smacking a home run against a lefty last night and will not take on RHP Clay Bucholz who is making is 2018 major league debut. The temperature in NY is expected to be in the high 70’s with winds blowing out to RF at 10-15 MPH and with Bucholz on the mound, I love the idea of using the Mets left-handed power as a salary saving mini-stack including Asdrubal Cabrera ($6.4K) and Jay Bruce ($6.7K).
MLB DFS Sample Line-Up and Slate Overview:
The line-up below is meant to be illustrative only to further back-up the logic laid out in previous slides and is not meant to be an optimal line-up or a roster you simply plug and play on your own!
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SP: Noah Syndergaard ($19.4K)
SP: Jack Flaherty ($12.7K)
IF: Didi Gregorious ($8.2K)
IF: Ozzie Albies ($10.1K)
IF: Asdrubal Cabrera ($6.4K)
OF: Aaron Judge ($10.9K)
OF: Giancarlo Stanton ($10K)
OF: Ronald Acuna Jr. ($8.2K)
UTIL: Michael Conforto ($7.5K)
UTIL: Tyler Flowers ($6.6K)
Slate Overview: Going into this slate my goal was to find a way to lock in Syndergaard as my SP1 and get as much Yankees/Braves exposure as possible. I think by using some of the value bats in the Mets line-up and being willing to drop down to Flaherty as my SP2, this build takes shape quite nicely and looks to give you a solid cash game floor with GPP upside. Enjoy your Sunday all!
Best of luck in your MLB DFS contests across FantasyDraft, FanDuel and DraftKings and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR for all the latest DFS news and analysis!