FanDuel MLB Daily Lineups: Monday June 18

Welcome to the FanDuel MLB Daily Lineups column for Monday, June 18th 2018. We’re a fantasy baseball column focused on helping you build a DFS MLB optimal lineup for each slate.

Yesterday’s Father’s Day results had some bizarre twists. Julio Teheran ($6,900), who admittedly had a decent match up against the Padres, suddenly fanned eleven batters in six innings for a win, quality start, and 61 FanDuel MLB points.

The result was surprising because it’s been a while since we’ve seen that from Teheran. In fact, is sporadic results are a big reason we generally avoid him. But if you owned him yesterday, you were in a great place. Julio carried many winning lineups on a very low 0.1% to 5% ownership across the slates.

We were high on Dylan Bundy, who had a great game aside from the two home runs he gave up to Justin Bour. But, that was the risk we knew he had in his start. While we though Aaron Nola would be the safer play, he was one of the worst plays of the night, but we avoided him in our lineups.

We liked the Padres and Braves game for offensive stacks. The Braves turned out to be the better side of that stack, but the total of five runs from the game was disappointing. Eddie Escobar had a solid 21.5 FanDuel MLB points for us in the offensive side of the lineup, even though the Twins only had one run.

But again, the five run total in the Indians and Twins stack was also disappointing. You were better off targeting the Brewers, Phillies, and Orioles stacks yesterday, which was very low-owned as well.

There are ten games on the MLB schedule today, giving us 20 pitchers to consider in tonight’s Main slate. However, there is one major caveat you need to consider. The Yankees are traveling to Nationals Park tonight, to complete a 3-3 game, starting in the sixth inning. Keep that in mind when building your lineups! FanDuel is locking their Main Slate tonight at 6:15pm. The Nats and Yankees have at least three more innings to play, and it’s hard to predict how that will impact the lineup for the following game. 

Before we get there, a reminder to never take a DFS MLB optimal lineup as ‘bible’ for your personal lineup each day. Use the suggestions as guidance. Also, make sure you follow final lineup thoughts throughout the day on our twitter account @FantasyCPR or me @mattymcmatt17 look for late breaking lineup news.

Weather Note: Today appears to be HOT across most of the country. With the summer heat come chances for thunderstorms in the evening. So check those weather reports around 5pm EDT. Right now, it appears the only storm and rain risks are in the Chicago, Cleveland, and Denver locations.

Most of those situations appear to be delays, but the Dodgers, Cubs, Indians, and White Sox could all experience lengthy rain delays, leading to challenging results for starting pitchers, or the potential for a postponement.

With weather-related considerations addressed, let’s get to the top pitching options…

FanDuel MLB: Top Pitcher Main Slate

We haven’t seen a slate with a list of pitchers this good in a while. While there are only 20 starting pitchers on the mound tonight, four have a K-rate over 30%, and 13 have a K-rate over 20%. That is a very decent ratio. We also have two starting pitchers with an xFIP below 3.00, and 11 of the 20 have an xFIP below 4.00.

So picking a decent pitcher tonight isn’t hard, but finding the best ceiling isn’t easy. Gerrit Cole ($11,000) has been a consistent headline for DFS MLB optimal lineups this season. Goal has 130 K’s in just 93.2 innings pitched, a low 2.40 ERA, and incredible 0.88 WHIP.

But like we said last week, Gerrit appears to be cooling off recently. We haven’t seen a result above 49 FanDuel MLB points since May 9th, and he doesn’t have more than eight K’s in a game since then as well. Also, while the Rays have a history of high K-rates each season, their K-rate against RHP’s this year is only 22%, and their wRC+ (99) is about average in the league. So the match up isn’t a juicy one.

I’m not paying $11,000 for a pitcher who gives me around 40 FanDuel MLB points. This lineup tonight is full of pitchers with that point potential. If you’re going to spend that much on a pitcher, grab Trevor Bauer ($11,200).

The White Sox saw Bauer recently, and he fanned 12 of the Sox hitters, and piled up 54 FanDuel MLB points even though he gave up three runs. However, I don’t like that the White Sox lineup has already seen a heavy dose of Bauer’s stuff, and this game has some weather-related risks.

Neither Miles Mikolas ($9,500) nor Zack Greinke ($9,100) have a good offensive match up in Philly and Los Angeles. They also likely don’t get more than 30 to 40 FanDuel MLB points for our lineups today. And Kenta Maeda ($8,300) has a less than ideal situation in Chicago against the Cubs.

As I continue to scan the list of pitchers, the metrics lead me to a result I wasn’t planning for. Jacob deGrom ($9,000) actually looks like a great play in Coors Field. The Rockies have a 23.7% K-rate against RHP’s this season, one of the highest in baseball, and their 76 wRC+ isn’t great either. When playing at Coors Field, their metrics don’t jump much, 23.3% and 80 wRC+.

Meanwhile, deGrom has a 32.8% K-rate and 2.76 xFIP, second best among all starting pitchers tonight. One of the metrics I like most about deGrom tonight is his low 0.41 home runs per nine innings. That is the lowest, aside from Dylan Covey who hasn’t pitched many games, yet, this year. So for $9K, we’re saving around $2K for our offensive stacks, and getting a decent shot at over 50 FanDuel MLB points with our pitcher pick.

FanDuel MLB: Top Hitting Stacks Main Slate

While looking at all of the great pitcher picks today, I started to worry about the offensive stacking targets tonight. Then we got down toward the bottom of the xFIP list, and man did it become obvious. With some other juicier lineup options like the Astros on the board tonight, hopefully this won’t be a chalky match up.

Bartolo Colon and Ian Kennedy face off against each other in Kansas City tonight. Colon has had a lot of DFS MLB fanfare this season, but his pitching performance is fading rapidly. Colon’s xFIP has dropped to 4.09, but the most interesting metric is the 2.29 home runs per nine innings. Along with a 4.94 ERA, that makes the Royals lineup an intriguing stacking option.

Aside from Mike Moustakas ($3,900), most of the Royals lineup is very affordable too. Even with Mike in our lineup, we can still afford Salvador Perez ($3,200) typically in the cleanup spot, and Alex Gordon ($2,700) likely hitting in the top five.

In the same game, Kennedy is giving up 1.47 home runs per five innings, fourth most of all starting pitchers today, and Ian has an ERA of over 5.00. Kennedy’s WHIP is also a horrendous 1.55. The Rangers had Rougned Odor ($2,300) hitting fifth yesterday. If that happens again, he’s a great value and makes affording Jurickson Profar ($3,500), Shin-Soo Choo ($3,600), and Nomar Mazara ($3,500) easy.

Two other stacks we like are the Angels against Zack Greinke and the Mets against Tyler Anderson. The Rockies starter is giving up 1.45 home runs per nine innings and will be in Coors Field tonight. The Mets don’t have a sexy lineup lately, but they could look good tonight.

Also, many will fade the Angels lineup, creating lower ownership, but against Greinke that could be a mistake. He’s a solid pitcher, but is also giving up around 1.5 home runs per nine innings, against several sluggers in Los Angels.

FanDuel MLB: Summary and Example Lineup

Before we do a quick re-cap of our lineup, and logic, we’re going to plug one of our favorite hitters into the utility spot tonight, no matter what. J.T. Realmuto ($3,300) is hot again, and he has Andrew Suarez on the mound for the Giants. Suarez is giving up nearly 1.4 home runs per nine innings and around five runs per game. This is a great match up for Realmuto ownership.

We scanned all of the pitchers tonight, and immediately pushed the Nats and Yankees aside given their low innings likelihood. Bauer and Cole may seem attractive, but their point potential considering their high salary makes us balk. Buried in the list of pitchers, we actually like deGrom in Coors Field the most tonight.

For offensive stacks, we may stick with one game tonight. The Royals and Rangers each have pitchers they’re facing who give up a lot of fly balls, and too many over the fence. So we’re stacking the top of each lineup, which plenty of cash to spend thanks to deGrom’s cheap pitching salary.

With that summary in mind, here’s a look at a sample lineup for the MAIN FanDuel MLB slate on Monday, June 18th 2018:

FanDuel MLB Main Slate Sample Lineup:

P              Jacob deGrom ($9,000)

C/1B       Salvador Perez ($3,200)

2B            Rougned Odor ($2,300)

3B            Mike Moustakas ($3,900)

SS            Jurickson Profar ($3,500)

OF           Alex Gordon ($2,700)

OF           Shin-Soo Choo ($3,600)

OF           Nomar Mazara ($3,500)

UTIL        J.T. Realmuto ($3,300)

Remaining Salary: $0

Note: This is a recommended lineup after discussing our top options for today. You should use this as a guide, and provide your own input when building FanDuel NHL lineups.  We are not telling you, or selling you, to use this lineup.

Next: MLB DFS Game by Game Breakdown

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