MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – Monday August 13
Welcome to the Monday 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.
After taking the weekend off from MLB DFS, we are back today to kick-off the work with some Picks and Pivots. This past weekend was my annual Fantasy Football keeper draft, a league we have had going now since around 2000 which has morphed into an all you can drink/eat/golf bonanza with a draft at the center of it. Always one of my favorite weekends of the year and also one that seems to take me longer to recover every year we do it. With that said, I have coffee and am ready to be an adult again (sort of).
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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 – Starting Pitching Overview:
It’s funny, for a slate with so many elite names at the top, I am finding myself really struggling to find any high-end arm I really want to build around. Jacob deGrom is the most expensive pitcher on the slate over $24K but I cannot talk myself into playing deGrom on the road in Yankee Stadium against a loaded line-up when we know if he gives up even a solo shot, there is a very real chance that would be enough to take an L considering the run support the Mets have given him.
Luis Severino on the other side is a curious case as his match-up against the Mets would seem like an ideal place to us him but as we convinced he has gotten past whatever struggles he had leading into his last start with the White Sox. The one positive thing we saw from Severino in that start was that he had a 16% swinging strike rate so there is some significant K upside here if he is on, but the rumbling of a dead arm for the Yankees right-hander give me pause in paying $23K for him on this specific slate.
Clayton Kershaw and Madison Bumgarner facing off against each other in LA is a marquee match-up in theory based off the resumes these two have amassed thus far but are either of these pitchers really worth paying nearly $20K for? Bumgarner has to face arguably the most loaded line-up in baseball in the Dodgers and Kershaw is coming off a game with only 1 strike-out and a 4% swinging strike rate which makes me question the upside we are paying up for here.
I suppose you could make the argument for Zack Greinke against Texas and the K upside that exists but as we saw with Tanaka on Friday, this line-up also has the power to align considerable risk with that upside.
I have named five elite arms across Major League Baseball all pitching today and yet there is not a single one of these match-ups I feel I HAVE to have – and that is really what it boils down to. We will touch on this in a second, but I actually think this is a slate to prioritize offense and then work backwards selecting your pitcher.
With that context in mind, let’s head to the other end of the pricing spectrum with near minimum priced Sean Reid-Foley ($8.3K) who will take on the Kansas City Royals in KC. One of the things I look for with rookie arms right away is whether they have the strikeout stuff in their arsenal to make an impact – the last thing I want is a rookie making his debut who relies on control and gets the first start jitters that derail your chances from the jump. Reid-Foley has a demonstrated track record through the minors of high K ability – with a 27.4% K rate at AAA this year after posting a 29.2% K rate at AA prior to his call-up.
Not only does Reid-Foley have K ability, he has also gone at least 94 pitches in 6 straight starts so there is enough length here to give you some significant K upside with his ability to work into the later innings of this game against one of the worst offenses in baseball post trade-deadline. What stands out to me most in looking at Red-Foley is this is a minor leaguer with a four pitch arsenal and that is important in my mind as you cannot afford to simply rely on your plus fastball at the major league level and the fact that he has reliable secondary pitches speaks to his status as one of the top Blue Jays prospects not named Vladimir Guerrero.
At this price point today, Reid-Foley is by far my favorite SP2 play and I am finding myself starting my builds with him, loading up on the bats I want and making my way back to find my second pitcher on FantasyDraft.
MLB DFS – Top Hitting Spots:
When I first opened this slate and saw we had arms like Bartolo Colon and Homer Bailey on the mound, I assumed the high totals would be all over the board but yet only one team, Arizona, has a team total over 5. I think this slate has more pitchers I want to pick on than actually roster so maybe paying up for bats is the way to attack this slate even though Vegas seems to be telling us this is a day that pitching is what wins.
Let’s start with Arizona, the chalk stack of the day, facing Bartolo Colon in Texas. We all know the deal by now – Colon is giving up 41% or higher hard contact to hitters from both sides of the plate with over a .200 ISO on the year and has four straight starts where he has given up 4+ runs. The Arizona price feel entirely too cheap to me on FantasyDraft where we can get David Peralta ($10K), AJ Pollock and Eduardo Escobar ($9.1K) and Paul Goldschmidt ($8.9K) for a reasonably priced stack. All four of these hitters have a .217 or higher ISO mark against RHP this season and when you consider their price points, I think they make for a cash game core and nothing more than a contrarian GPP fade.
The Indians may not be at home where they normally flourish and they have bats like Edwin Encarnacion and Leonys Martin on the DL but they get to play in Great American Ballpark tonight against Homer Bailey – how is this total not over 5? Bailey is giving up a .250 ISO mark to left-handed batters on the season with a 2.3 HR/9 mark at home versus LHB this season and is somehow supposes to navigate the top four of the Indians order here in Jose Ramirez, Francisco Lindor, Michael Brantley and Yonder Alonso? I could argue this four man stack is the priority over the Arizona bats but on this slate, I am finding myself using both with a punt SP2 like Reid-Foley without any real difficulty.
The Cardinals are my third favorite stack on this slate against LHP Tommy Milone who is coming off a 7 ER outing against the Braves and when you consider that this is a pretty much all right-handed line-up, it could be another spot where Milone gets blasted. Over the last two seasons, Milone is giving up a .305 ISO to RHB so you could pick and choose any of the Cardinals RHB here but do not overlook Matt Carpenter ($9.9K) who has a .309 ISO mark against LHP this season. Milone relies nearly 85% of the time on a fastball/slider combination to LHB in 2018 which are two pitches that Carpenter has hit extremely well, sporting a .750 ISO mark against high 80’s fastballs and a .300 ISO mark against sliders. Carpenter is probably my favorite one-off play on the board even in a lefty-lefty match-up.
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: Sean-Reid Foley ($8.3K)
SP: Sean Manaea ($14.4K)
IF: Francisco Lindor ($11.1K)
IF: Yonder Alonso ($8.2K)
IF: Eduardo Escobar ($9.1K)
OF: Jose Ramirez ($11K)
OF: AJ Pollock ($9.1K)
OF: David Peralta ($10K)
UTIL: Paul Goldschmidt ($8.9K)
UTIL: Matt Carpenter ($9.9K)
Slate Overview: So many times in MLB DFS I find myself starting my roster decisions based off pitching – it is the first position you have on any DFS site and I think it would be common for most players to start their daily build there and even more so on a day with so many elite names to chose from. However on this day I am finding myself working backwards, prioritizing bats against some of the worst arms in baseball – Colon, Bailey and Milone – locking in a high K SP2 like Reid-Foley and simply seeing what is left. In this example, I had the exact amount left-over for Sean Manaea, a solid home favorite (-135) against a Mariners team that has the third lowest run total on the slate – not a play I am screaming is a must play but it seems like a relatively safe/strong cash play and one of those “it won’t hurt you/win you a slate” kind of plays wrapped around stacks you think can go off and actually be the difference maker. This is just my first look so interested to see what you all think today – hit me up on Twitter @2LockSports and let’s talk some MLB DFS action on this Monday. Good luck all!
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Best of luck in your MLB DFS contests today across FantasyDraft, FanDuel and DraftKings and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR each day for all your DFS news and analysis!