FanDuel MLB Daily Lineups: Monday July 23

Welcome back to the FanDuel MLB Daily Lineups column for Monday, July 23rd 2018. We’re a fantasy baseball column focused on helping you build a DFS MLB optimal lineup for each slate.

With the All Star break and July family vacations, it’s been hard to stay focused on FanDuel MLB lineups over the last two weeks. But we’re back, and focused. A lot has happened in the last two weeks, but some of the June forward trends have continued.

Oddly for a Monday night, we have almost a full slate of 13 games to pick through. That’s two games short, or four teams, of a full MLB schedule. So tonight’s Man FanDuel MLB slate is fairly robust with a lot of options.

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: A somewhat stagnate weather system continues to spin through the eastern part of the U.S., providing constant deluges of showers and thunderstorms in key MLB locations. Philadelphia and Baltimore, specifically, have the worst odds of playing tonight. For that reason, we’re fading the Phillies, Dodgers, Red Sox, and Orioles.

Additionally, the Pirates and Indians have delay and small postponement risks, along with the Padres and Mets. In fact, once you consider all of the weather issues, this begins to feel more like the typical smaller Monday FanDuel MLB Main slate.

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

FanDuel MLB: Top Pitcher Main Slate

When I started writing this article in the morning, I was all over Ross Stripling ($9,600) against the Phillies. Even in Citizens Bank Park, were the Phils offense has been better, they’d likely hit a wall with Stripling on the mound.

Over the last 30 days, Ross has a 2.88 xFIP. That’s easily better than any other starter on the mound tonight, including Jacob deGrom ($11,500), Luis Severino ($11,400), or Corey Kluber ($11,000).

Stripling’s 23.7% K-rate over the last month also matches up very well with the Phillies dreadful 24.6% strikeout rate since June 1st against RHP’s. Unfortunately for us, Stripling and the Dodgers likely won’t get their game in against the Phillies tonight.

But, as we approach lock and the weather looks better than originally reported, Stripling is a great play with our top-two offensive stacks.

So, where do we go from here? That’s a great question. With so many weather-related impacts to the games tonight, many of the top arms are likely stuck in the dugout waiting word of weather they’ll play or heading home, back to the hotel.

So, we shifted our focus to better weather games. Also, we had to temper our expectations a bit, tonight, with the highest ceiling arms potentially not playing. While doing that, one value play jumped off the board for us immediately.

Jaime Barria ($5,900) has a 5.12 xFIP and 17.7% K-rate. So when you look at the initial list of pitchers and scan their metrics, Barria isn’t someone you fall in love with. But, in his last four straight outings, Jamie has lasted at least five innings each time, and lands around four to five K’s per game. That’s enough to get you 20 to 30 FanDuel MLB points, and leaves plenty of cash on the table for some BIG offensive plays tonight.

Yeah, but what about the match up? Well, that’s where it gets better. Jaime is a right-handed pitcher. The same type of RHP the Chicago White Sox have fanned 27.4% of the time since June 1st. The ChiSox are also failing to score against RHP’s lately, with a low 82 wRC+.

There’s risk, but this is a solid 20 to 30 FanDuel MLB point play, loading your lineup with talented offense, while shooting for a 30 to 40 point ceiling at the pitcher spot.

FanDuel MLB: Top Hitting Stacks Main Slate

Again, when I began writing about tonight’s slate, I focused around Stripling being my starting pitcher. Although, regardless of who’s in the pitcher spot, I love two stacks tonight. One is a value play with solid run potential. The other could be a bigger point play.

While there are many great arms starting on the mound tonight, boy are there some terrible pitchers as well. Four of tonight’s starting pitchers have averaged over two home runs per nine innings in the last 30 days. Surprisingly, that includes Trevor Bauer. No, we’re not stacking the the Pirates…just thought that was interesting.

Another surprising pitcher who’s struggled lately is Sean Newcomb. And early season fantasy baseball darling at the starting pitcher spot, Newcomb’s fantasy value is falling off a cliff. In the last month, Sean has a horrendous 6.22 xFIP, and is giving up 2.5 home runs per nine innings. And tonight, Sean and the Braves travel to Miami to play the Marlins.

Yes, those Marlins. I don’t think we’ve targets the Marlins as an offensive stack all season, so even I’m surprised. But against a struggling Newcomb, it makes sense to stack guys like J.T. Realmuto ($3,300) batting third with Starlin Catsro ($3,300), and a red-hot Cameron Maybin ($2,800).

We’re likely going with those three, regardless of the pitching play. So who else to do we love tonight? Well, we’ve targeted Lucas Giolito all season, and there’s no reason to stop tonight. That means stacking the Angels with Mike Trout ($4,500) and the Halo bats.

We continue to hear how the White Sox won the trade with the Nationals last off-season, sending Adam Eaton to the Nats in exchange for prized pitching prospect Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez. With Eaton’s health struggles and Lopez fastball upside, I guess that argument holds. But boy, does Giolito seem like a bust so far!

After a horrendous start, Lucas has somehow maintained a decent 1.20 WHIP in the last 30 days. However, at the same time, his xFIP is still a terrible 5.53, he’s giving up 1.8 home runs per nine, has a low 14.4% K-rate, and high 12.5% walk rate. That bodes well for the Angels in Anaheim tonight.

FanDuel MLB: Summary and Example Lineup

OK. So we loved Ross Stripling at the pitcher spot before we finally caved to the weather-related concerns in Philly. Instead, we’re likely plugging Angels starter Barria into the pitcher spot generating a ton of value against the White Sox.

We loved the Marlins and Angels lineups with Stripling at pitcher. In fact, we were stacking both teams. However, with greater salary on the table now, we’re still playing a lot of Marlins, with Trout, and looking for bigger batting options across the lineups. A couple of red-hot bats jumped out at us like Rendon, Suarez, Peraza, and Carpenter.  And don’t look now…but is Bryce Harper developing a hitting streak?!

With that summary in mind, here’s a look at a sample lineup for the MAIN FanDuel MLB slate on Monday, July 23rd 2018:

FanDuel MLB Main Slate Sample Lineup: 

P                Jaime Barria ($5,900)

C/1B         J.T. Realmuto ($3,300)

2B             Starlin Castro ($3,300)

3B             Eugenio Suarez ($3,600)

SS              Jose Peraza ($3,300)

OF             Mike Trout ($4,500)

OF             Bryce Harper ($4,100)

OF             Cameron Maybin ($2,800)

UTIL          Matt Carpenter ($4,200)

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 MLB lineups.  We are not telling you, or selling you, to use this lineup.

Next: MLB DFS Game by Game Breakdown

Best of luck in your FanDuel MLB contests and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR for all your DFS news and analysis across MLB, PGA, and World Cup this summer!