MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – Tuesday May 29
Welcome to the Tuesday 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.
Monday’s early MLB DFS was headlined by the big arms in Jacob deGrom and Justin Verlander band although they both had solid outings, they were not able to pay off their lofty point totals as the mid-tier/punt arms like Mike Montgomery, Matthew Boyd and Brent Suter were the better point per dollar plays that allowed you to pay up for bats and separate you from the rest of the field.
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 Pitching Overview:
The first thing I do when I open a slate is look through the pricing and see if there is anything that jumps out to me – something that is just screaming at you and the rest of the industry to play – and most times the sites make it where those plays are hard to find but tonight we have Danny Duffy ($8K) at home against Minnesota – one of the few name pitchers we will ever see at minimum price in MLB DFS.
It may seem odd for me to start my slate overview with the lowest priced arm on the slate, a pitcher with a 6.14 ERA who is a home underdog (120) facing a Twins team with the fifth highest run projection on the slate but I firmly believe as the day unfolds, the decision to play Duffy or not is going to be one that the majority of people zero in on as a core roster decision.
First of all you have to consider slate context – we do not have any must have arm on this slate as Charlie Morton is our highest priced arm pitching against the Yankees in Yankee Stadium so the opportunity cost at SP is lower than it would be most nights. Secondly, we have a game in Coors Field with Jeff Samardzija pitching so we will need salary savings somewhere and locking in Duffy as your SP2 (1?) gives you a crystal clear path to get there.
The question is – do you or I want to play chalk Danny Duffy? My gut reaction was to simply stack up Brian Dozier and Miguel Sano and leverage the bejesus out of this spot but at $8K, am I getting too cute here? Look at it this way, the Twins are striking out at the 5th highest mark against LHP in all of baseball this season (25.4%) and one of the biggest changes in their recent line-up build is that Miguel Sano is back and healthy while Joe Mauer went to the D.L. Now Sano is a scary power bat for sure, but think of it another way – you take a hitter in Mauer who rarely strikes out and replace him in the heart of the Twins order with Sano, a hitter with a team high 32% K rate against LHP and you further add to the upside of Duffy in this spot.
I have seen a lot of talk about Duffy this year that he has fallen off but I think many (including me) misrepresented Duffy as this high K fireballing arm when the reality is, his velocity is exactly where it was last year but his K rate and swinging strike rate have both dropped 2-3% down to 18% and 9% respectively. Maybe he’s not going to throw 95+ like he was back in 2016 and prior but would his numbers from 2017 really be something we would overlook at minimum price? Duffy last season had a 21% K rate, an 11% swinging strike rate and pitched to a 3.48 ERA at home with 0.59 HR/9 allowed with a 22% K rate.
Duffy has put up 19 or more fantasy points on FantasyDraft in four of his last nine starts which would simply crush value at this price point but there is more upside at this price than I am willing to overlook when you consider what it means for the rest of your roster build. I know I have spent entirely too much time pontificating on Danny Duffy but as I write this at 5AM EST, my guess is I won’t be the only one seeing him as a key to unlocking today’s slate. Chalk Danny Duffy night baby!
Luis Castillo ($15K) and Zack Godley ($16.9K) will face off against each other in Arizona with the roof closed in a game where I think either pitcher is a viable choice tonight. The price difference is substantial enough where I find myself initially siding with Castillo even as the road underdog as this is an arm with an elite 15% swinging strike rate on the season that will face an Arizona team that strikes out at the third highest mark in baseball this season against RHP (26%). Castillo has gone five straight starts allowing 2 ER or fewer and has struck out 31 batters in his last 28.2 IP but what really stands out to me is that he has allowed 25% or less hard contact in three of his last four starts while relying on his ground ball dominance and swing and miss ability to get through these outings.
On a slate without any clear-cut “must have” pitching – Castillo and Duffy are a solid strikeout tandem facing off against two strikeout heavy team and their price points are such where I have $9.6K per batter to fill out my hitters and I think this is the perfect slate to take that roster approach!
MLB DFS – Top Hitting Spots:
With two mid/low-priced pitchers locked into our line-ups to start we have all the money we want to go after the biggest bats on the slate and with Jeff Samardzija in Coors Field, this is stop number one on the hitting tour. The Shark on the season has a 16% K rate, a 15% walk rate and is giving up 2.3 HR/9 and a 31% hard contact rate outside of San Francisco on the season. Most notably has been his struggles against left-handed batters as they are sporting a crisp .259 ISO with a 54% fly ball rate – so let’s recap, a pitcher who walks as many batters as he strikes out, who is getting only an 8% swinging strike rate and is giving up a ton of fly balls has to pitch in Coors Field? Sometimes chalk is chalk for a good reason folks.
Charlie Blackmon and David Dahl are the two top bats from the left side of the plate as each batter has over a .210 ISO against RHP this season with 37% plus hard contact rates and can be paired with Nolan Arenado as a nice top of the order three-man stack. Over the last season plus, Arenado and Blackmon have simply owned Samardjiza for you BvP lovers out there – going a combined 11 for 30 with 4 doubles, 2 triples and a home run with Blackmon sporting a decent .500 ISO against the Shark in his 16 at bats. Lock button.
After missing the last two games with an injury it sounds like Mookie Betts will be back in the Red Sox line-up tonight against the Blue Jays and Marco Estrada and that is great news for Boston and a Red Sox stack as Estrada is giving up a .250+ ISO to hitters from both sides of the plate with a 55% fly ball rate. The top four in the Red Sox stack rivals the Rockies stack tonight as the best place for hitting as all of Betts, Andrew Benintendi, J.D. Martinez and Mitch Moreland have crush RHP this season with Mookie, JD and Moreland all sporting absurd .360+ ISO rates this season.
If you want another stack option, I would not overlook the Astros bats against C.C. Sabathia who has quietly been very bad in his last two starts and has to take on an Astros offense that may be starting to find their groove. Over his last two starts Sabathia has pitched 9.1 innings, giving up 10 hits, 7 walks, 3 HR and 9 ER and over the last week no team in baseball has scored more runs than the Astros. Remember this is a team with four guys at the top of the line-up in George Springer, Jose Altuve, Alex Bregman and Carlos Correa who had .200+ ISO’s versus left-handed pitching last season and although the results haven’t been there yet – all four of these guys have 35% plus HC rates against LHP this season and with warm temperatures in New York, this could be the spot the Astros bats break out in a big way as a somewhat forgotten stack with Coors on the board.
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: Luis Castillo ($15K)
SP: Danny Duffy ($8K)
IF: Nolan Arenado ($10.8K)
IF: Mitch Moreland ($8K)
IF: Jeimer Candelario ($6.6K)
OF: Charlie Blackmon ($11K)
OF: David Dahl ($8.2K)
OF: Mookie Betts ($12K)
UTIL: J.D. Martinez ($10.2K)
UTIL: Andrew Benintendi ($10.2K)
Slate Overview: As much as I want to find ways away from the Danny Duffy build, his inclusion as my SP2 gives me a clear path to stacking up two offenses in the Rockies and Red Sox that have the ability to simply crush this slate and I want in. Without any must have arms, I am willing to drop down at pitcher tonight, take a few shots on cheap K arms like Godley, Castillo and Duffy and use the savings to load up on the best bats available. Good luck tonight 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!