MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – Friday August 10
Welcome to the Friday 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.
Thursday’s MLB DFS slate started out with a bang as the Yankees stack launched homeruns from Giancarlo Stanton, Neil Walker, Miguel Andujar and Aaron Hicks and J.A. Happ struck out 9 on his way to 25 FPTS as the top scoring pitcher on the slate. The big star of the night was Mookie Betts who hit for the cycle as the top scoring fantasy play on the night with 34 fantasy points on FantasyDraft. Basically you needed offense on this night as the Yankees, Mariners and the Coors Field bats went off with the only pitcher being Happ entering the top 10 scorers on this night.
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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 – Main Slate Overview:
Apologies for the delay – this weekend is my annual Fantasy Football draft and so the “festivities” which began last night are causing me to be a but slower today than normal but I will soldier on with the help of coffee and greasy foods.
Looking at this slate tonight, it is tough for me to avoid Masahiro Tanaka ($20.6K) who has been simply incredible since the beginning of June where he has made 7 starts with a 32% K rate and 15% swinging strike rate and is averaging 24 FPTS over that time frame. This Texas team has a 25.4% K rate against RHP this season so there is considerable upside to go with the “floor” of Tanaka in cash games as a massive -200 favorite where the Rangers have the second lowest run total on the board, projected to score a full 1.1 run lower than their season average.
Clay Holmes ($8K) is a very interesting punt play as he not only gets the best pitching environment in San Francisco against the Giants but this is an arm with some considerable strikeout upside relative to his price point when you look at his minor league numbers. Holmes had a 24% K rate in AAA this season and has thrown 94+ pitches in three of his last four minor league starts so we could get solid innings and K’s in a nice run prevention spot. Holmes made one start earlier this year against Milwaukee where he went 6 innings, striking out 6 and putting up 25+ FPTS and tonight against a Giants team that strikes out at a 23% clip versus RHP, this is one of the best point per dollar plays that allows you to pay up for a Tanaka/Gerrit Cole type ace AND get all the bats you want.
One of the reasons I want Holmes as my SP2 is we have so many great offenses and so many bad pitchers on the hill with my favorite spot being the Yankees against LHP Mike Minor in the Bronx. On the season, Minor is giving up a .225 ISO and 40% HC rate with a 45% FB rate which is simply the nut match-up for the Yankee power bats. Aaron Hicks and Giancarlo Stanton both have .330+ ISO marks versus LHP this season while Gleyber Torres, Miguel Andujar and Luke Voigt all have .230+ marks of their own so there is a reason this team has the highest implied run total on the slate even with Coors on the docket.
Speaking of Coors, as good as Jon Gray can be, this is also a pitcher with a .210 ISO versus LHP with 38% HC rate and this Dodgers team is simply loaded with too many lefties to avoid having some exposure here. This Dodgers projected line-up has a .254 ISOP versus RHP this season with Joc Pederson (.313 ISO), Max Muncy (.329 ISO) and Cody Bellinger (.245 ISO) all standing out as elite plays on this slate.
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: Masahiro Tanaka ($20.6K)
SP: Clay Holmes ($8K)
IF: Gleyber Torres ($8.9K)
IF: Miguel Andujar ($8.2K)
IF: Luke Voit ($6.6K)
OF: Giancarlo Stanton ($9.7K)
OF: Aaron Hicks ($9.4K)
OF: Joc Pederson ($9.7K)
UTIL: Max Muncy ($9.4K)
UTIL: Charlie Blackmon ($9.5K)
Slate Overview: It may seem lazy to just stack the Yankees and Coors Field but is there a need to get cute if you can make it work and still get arguably the best SP on this slate? Holmes is the key that makes this whole build work as a true punt SP2 and at this point, I think this is a viable cash and GPP build. Good luck kids – I am going to get more coffee.
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Best of luck in your MLB DFS contests and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR for all the latest DFS news and analysis!