MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – Thursday June 28
Welcome to the Thursday 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.
Wednesday’s MLB DFS slate was one that I know many felt very blah about – there was no real exciting arm or offense to stack and boy did the results follow that feeling. Looking back, there was not a single player on FantasyDraft who went for over 30 fantasy points and the top 6 performers were all starting pitchers – some we expected like Madison Bumgarner, Zack Wheeler and Robbie Ray but others like Mike Minor and Zach Eflin put up solid outings. Offensively there was a whole lot of nothing except for a few home runs from guys like J.D. Martinez, Kyle Seager and Willson Contreras in what was a generally underwhelming night of DFS MLB action.
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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 – Early Slate Pitching Overview:
We get a nice little five game afternoon slate on FantasyDraft which kicks off at 1:10PM EST and you will notice leaves off the Arizona-Miami game which is slated for a noon start. Even with Zack Greinke out of the player pool, we still have a few great arms on this short slate with no bigger name than Clayton Kershaw ($23.1K) who will get a home start against the Cubs. The question with Kershaw is ultimately what sort of pitch count will he be on as he only threw 55 pitches in his first start off the DL and lasted just three innings against the Mets.
After missing nearly a month with a back injury and skipping rehab starts to go right back to the major league mound, it seems aggressive to pay full price for Kershaw here when we really have no idea what to expect. I have not seen anything as of this writing to indicate pitch count but will absolutely update on Twitter (@2LockSports) once I find something. The reality is this – Kerhsaw is the best arm available to us on a short slate and is the largest favorite (-180) on the board and we saw earlier this year with Madison Bumgarner that most will take the wait and see approach and miss out on the “I am back” start at lower ownership. If Kershaw only throws 80 pitches is that enough for you to take the risk? I think we need to look at the rest of the slate before making that decision – let’s move on.
The best arm on this slate in my opinion is Jon Gray ($18.8K) who gets the biggest ballpark boost moving from Coors to AT&T Park in San Francisco and steps to the mound in tremendous recent form. Over the last month, Gray has a 33.9% K rate which is the fourth highest mark in all of baseball and has put up a 13.9% or higher swinging strike rate in five consecutive starts. K’s are king in MLB DFS and Gray has by far the biggest upside on this slate and even though he struggled in an earlier season start in San Francisco where he gave up 5 ER and struck out only 4 in 3.2 IP, keep in mind there was some luck involved in that start as the Giants had a .563 BABIP in that game. For the price discount off Kershaw and the considerable K upside, Gray is my favorite SP1 on this slate and I think the arm to build around in all formats.
Now it is certainly possible to go Kershaw AND Gray on this slate if you are so inclined but if you want to drop down at SP2 than I think Jake Odorizzi ($13K) against the White Sox is a strong choice. Odorizzi is today’s Kyle Gibson, a pitcher that became the chalk option on last night’s slate at 40% ownership in tournaments and although he did strike out 7 batters, he also surrendered 5 ER against the White Sox. If you played Gibson last night, than you have to feel the same way about using Odorizzi as this is much more about the match-up than it is about the pitcher.
Odorizzi has faced this team twice already this season going 5 innings with 7 K’s and 3 ER (15 FP) last outing after an earlier 5.1 IP, 8 K, 3 ER outing for 18 FP back on May 3rd. Those stat lines are basically what you are hoping for here again today – 2-3 runs with 7-8 K’s and a 15-20 fantasy point outing from your SP2 that lets you take all the bats you want. I am interested to see how the industry talks this spot up today as Gibson’s popularity and subsequent mediocre performance could lead to some recency bias where people simply move on to another spot.
If you want a pivot off Odorizzi on this short slate, is it crazy to consider Mike Leake ($12.6K) against the Orioles? The short answer is probably but look at the K rates against RHP for some of the bats in this projected O’s line-up – Rasmus (42%), Davis (37%), Joseph (33%), Beckham (28%) – in fact the projected Baltimore line-up has a 27.4% projected K rate.
Now pretend for a second we didn’t know this was Mike Leake and I told you that there was a punt pitcher that has given up 2 runs or fewer in 6 of his last seven games with the following fantasy point totals – 29, 19, 18, 24, 21 and 15 in those outings. Leake has limited K upside on his own yet his recent form and the Orioles K heavy line-up make him an interesting choice as a punt SP2 on a slate where you need to find some way to be different.
MLB DFS – Early Slate Hitting:
One of the reasons I think we could see Kershaw go under-owned here (in addition to the pitch count concerns) is we have a ton of great hitting spots to attack with the Mariners, Twins and White Sox all having high projected run totals and with people wanting to spend up on hitting will they forego the hefty price tag on the unknown of Kershaw.
I know this will shock many but the Dodgers come into this slate as one of my favorite stacks for two simple reasons – 1) the price point makes them an ideal stack if paying up for pitching and 2) they face off with LHP Jose Quintana who is giving up an ISO just under .200 with a 43% HC rate to RHB this season. I bring this up every time the Dodgers face a lefty but you have a line-up here in LA that just destroys LHP the last two seasons as 6 of the projected 8 batters in the line-up have a .180 or higher ISO with a 38% or higher HC rate against southpaws.
The Dodgers have a 4.4 run total which puts then squarely behind teams like the Mariners and Twins today and the “name value” of Jose Quintana could lead this to be a spot where they go under-owned and on a five game slate we need every edge we can get.
Chris Taylor is expected back in the Dodgers line-up today which is a massive boost to this match-up as the top four Dodgers in the line-up – Taylor, Enrique Hernandez, Justin Turner and Matt Kemp all have .200+ ISO against LHP since 2017 and adding in a L/L match-up with Cody Bellinger ($9.2K) who will likely go totally ignored at this price point seems like a great tournament strategy considering his .261 ISO against lefties since 2017.
To me, it is pretty clear on this slate that the Mariners and Twins will be the chalk spots to go to and in order to fit them in on this slate you are going to have to roll the dice with a Mike Leake or Jake Odorizzi as your SP2 which feels like a gross way to eat the chalk. Instead the Dodgers bats who I would argue are just as talented if not more so than the Mariners/Twins, are priced at a point where you can stack them up 5-6 strong and fit in both Kershaw and Gray.
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: Clayton Kershaw ($23.1K)
SP: Jon Gray ($18.8K)
IF: Justin Turner ($7.7K)
IF: Cody Bellinger ($9.1K)
IF: Austin Barnes ($5.5K)
OF: Matt Kemp ($7.7K)
OF: Kike’ Hernandez ($7.3K)
OF: Chris Taylor ($7.4K)
UTIL: Logan Morrison ($6.7K)
UTIL: Matt Joyce (6.5K)
Slate Overview: The more I look at this slate, the more I realized that in order to stack up the Twins and Mariners it meant I had to play Jake Odorizzi or Mike Leake as my SP2 and all the while there was a relatively easy path to getting both Jon Gray and Clayton Kershaw into my builds. I mentioned this before, but this Kershaw spot reminds me so much of the Bumgarner start against the Padres where everyone took a wait and see approach and I even advocated stacking Padres against him and then we sit back and remember why these guys are the best arms in the game.
Obviously we need to get some confirmation that Kershaw’s pitch count will be higher – you cannot pay $23K for 60 pitches – but would it shock anyone if this is the “I am back” start where Kershaw goes out and throws 7-8 innings, strikes out double-digit Cubs and we all wonder why we didn’t simply jam him in on a five game slate?
MLB DFS – Main Slate Overview:
The four game Main Slate is ugly and potential rain issues in Boston could make it even tougher to navigate through but we all love MLB DFS and want to play every slate we can so let’s dig in. There are two very clear pitching options at the top with Aaron Nola and Lance McCullers Jr. who are both priced above $21K on FantasyDraft and become the obvious top arms on an underwhelming pitching slate. The question is – do we want to play them?
In a vacuum, I think the answer would be yes but I think both arms are over-priced and I also don’t think we have viable cheap hitters capable of making up the difference. Nola’s DFS upside comes from facing right-handed heavy line-ups where his 30% K rate against RHB can help pay off his price but today with a left-handed heavy Nationals team, this does not appear to be the spot to pay up for Nola. This game just happened in Washington and Nola was limited to only 5 K’s so I honestly do not see the upside in this spot and would argue that the leverage play of using guys like Bryce Harper and Daniel Murphy is a more viable strategy when you consider Nola’s likely popularity as a result of limited options.
McCullers seems like the obvious pivot as he is not only cheaper than Nola but he also pitches against a considerably weaker opponent in the Rays in one of the best pitcher’s parks in all of baseball in Tampa Bay so if you wanted to pay up, this is the top spot on the board and I am not sure it’s really close. The risk with McCullers is always his inability to be efficient with his pitch count which means he rarely goes deep into games but when you consider the Rays strike out at the highest rate in baseball (27%) over the last two weeks, there is clear upside here that I am not sure any other arm has.
The struggle is that if we opt to pay for McCullers than we are in essence fading the top bats and with a 10.5 run total in Fenway tonight, I am finding myself more inclined to stack up the Red Sox and Angels. This one is simple – if you are stacking this game against Jaime Barria and LHP Brian Johnson, then you are grabbing the big guns – Mike Trout, Justin Upton, Andrew Benintendi, Mookie Betts and J.D. Martinez – and hoping that the offensive upside carries you past those who pay up for Nola and McCullers.
If you opt to go this route you are going to be rolling the dice at pitcher with arms like Junior Guerra, Anthony DeSclafani and/or Tanner Roark. Honestly, I cannot endorse any of these arms with any true confidence – you are simply landing here by default – it becomes one of those slates where simply build around the bats you want and figure out which pitchers work. One thing to note – the Rays are going with a bullpen game and Ryan Yarbrough ($11.3K) has been confirmed as the “closer” after Ryan Stanek “starts” the game. Yarbrough has done well in this role previously this season, having six of these games so far in 2018 and he has put up 25, 19 and 17 fantasy points in three of those six outings so if you want to game stack the Red Sox and Angels pricey bats – than this may be the SP2 that makes it work.
My goal every day is to give you advice to build your best line-ups – and today, my best advice might just be to take this slate off. I can make a strong case for Lance McCullers at pitcher and not much else and I love the idea of game stacking the Red Sox/Angels but the issue is you cannot do both so which do you want to roll with? Sometimes the best play in DFS is simply not to play – if you want to save some bankroll and live to fight another day than maybe just throw a GPP dart or two for enjoyment and get ready for Friday’s slate.
Next: DFS MLB Game by Game Breakdowns
Best of luck in your MLB DFS contests and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR for all the latest DFS news and analysis!