MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – Tuesday, September 4
Welcome to the Tuesday 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.
Welcome back after a few days off from MLB DFS and Picks and Pivots as my wife and I took an anniversary trip to Chicago. Thank you to the rest of the Fantasy CPR crew for holding down the fort while I was out and for all the well wishes on social media from readers and a whole lot of Jon Lester related grief!
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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:
Welcome back to some MLB DFS action on this Tuesday and although I am sure man of you have your eye towards the start of the Fantasy Football season on Thursday, we still have baseball to be played and this can be a great time to take advantage of distracted players across the rest of the industry.
Every fifth day, I open up my FantasyDraft app and I expect to see the price on German Marquez rise to a point consistent with his recent production but here we are once again where Marquez at only $17.7K is the fifth highest priced pitcher on the slate. Now, I understand that Marquez is pitching in Coors Field, hence the discount, but the simple fact is – this is a pitcher with elite K upside who gets to face one of the weakest offenses in baseball in the SF Giants.
Over the last 30 days, Marquez is sporting a 32.6% K rate which is just 1% behind Justin Verlander who is priced at $7K more on this slate, putting in easily in the top 10 in all of baseball during that time frame. Marquez has not only flashed upside, with 30+ fantasy points in each of his last two starts, but he has also been arguably the most consistent arm over the last month with 7 straight starts of 20+ fantasy points.
Compare that to the other top arms on this slate – Verlander has only gone for 20+ three times in that span, Mike Clevinger (3), J.A. Happ (5) and Rich Hill (2). The way I always approach the Rockies arms when they are in good spots is – would this guy be a lock and load play for me with the same opponent in any other ballpark? Think of it this way – if this game was in San Francisco, Marquez would be a no hesitation play for you right? So why again are we worried about a guy who has put up 20, 25, 29 and 31 fantasy points in his last four home starts in Coors Field? I will just keeping riding the hot hand here – no need to get cute.
One of the things I preach when it comes to playing DFS is to do your own research first, get your player pool, and then read/listen to as many other trusted voices in the industry as you can. I make a point to listen to my friends over at Wisetake.com and their free podcast each day and they have been consistently on Lucas Giolito ($12.7K) for weeks and I remember listening to them prior to his last start against Boston and although I was not brave enough to pull the trigger in that start, it was a case where he simply stored it away and promised I would keep an eye on him for the right spot.
Well after a strong four start stretch where Giolito has averaged 23 fantasy points including two starts against the very same Tigers team he will face today, I think this is the spot we have been waiting for. In his previous two recent starts against the Tigers, Giolito has gone 13 innings with 13 K’s, only 2 walks and put up 20 and 27 fantasy points and at this price point has simply too much upside to ignore.
During this four game stretch, Giolito has a 27% K rate and an 11.4% swinging strike rate and this is not just case where we are game log watching and cherry picking a recent sample size to support our argument.
As the folks at FanGraphs have pointed out – there are some serious changes in his recent form including a significant uptick in his fastball velocity which has been sitting at nearly 94 MPH in his last four starts as opposed to 90-92 MPH throughout much of the earlier parts of this season. As the article points out – seriously, I know it is long but take the time to read it if you want to play Giolito, it is well worth your time – there has been a chance in his arm angle and in his mechanics which supports the uptick in velocity but he is also seeing a substantial uptick in generating groundballs at nearly 55% during this recent run as opposed to his 43% season long average.
The recent production, considering it is against the same opponent tonight, when you overlay it with his demonstrated changes in approach that are driving this success, makes paying under $13K for a pitcher of this caliber feel like a steal and it opens up so much for you when you start building your offenses tonight.
MLB DFS – Top Hitting Spots
I may have taken a few days off from MLB DFS, but I know exactly how to get right back into the swing of things when I open up a slate where I see Jason Vargas pitching against the Los Angeles Dodgers loaded line-up. Now we just finished telling you about a pitcher in Lucas Giolito who despite some ugly season long numbers, has made some material changes in his game to support a recent uptick in his performance and although Vargas has now has a solid four game run, surrendering 2 or fewer runs in each start, I do not believe we are looking at anything more than some good luck.
From a pitch type/velocity perspective there is almost no change in the recent games for Vargas versus his season long numbers but he looks to finally be getting balls hit at fielders as his season long BABIP of .333 is significantly higher than his .258 mark the last four games. On the year, Vargas is giving up a massive .237 ISO to RHB with a 34% HC rate and his two-pitch arsenal against righties (sinker/change-up) seem to work perfectly into the Dodgers strengths.
If you have read Picks and Pivots even once before, you know this is my favorite team to stack and once again there is not a single Dodger bat over $10K, with the majority of the targets we want from the right-side being in an affordable $8K range. Since the start of the 2017 season, this Dodgers projected line-up has a .200 ISO against LHP with four players (Dozier, Machado, Turner and Hernandez) all sporting individual marks above .200 during that time frame.
Looking at Vargas pitch types, he throws his sinker nearly 40% of the time against RHB and we have four batters from the Dodgers with .300+ ISO marks against that pitch type in 2018 – Turner, Taylor, Hernandez and Kemp. Although this is a pitch that Brian Dozier has struggled with in 2018, he has historically crushed this pitch to the tune of a .230 ISO and 43% HC rate.
This is pretty simple for me – if you are in the Dodgers line-up, you are likely in my stack consideration with my focus on guys like Manny Machado, Justin Turner, Brian Dozier, Matt Kemp, Enrique Hernandez and the newest RHB, David Freese, who is 7 for 12 with 2 HR’s against Vargas in his career.
The beauty of this stack in conjunction with Marquez/Giolito is that you have over $10K per batter for your last two spots meaning you could go a variety of different ways within this build including paying up for elite hitters like Mike Trout, J.D. Martinez or my favorite – Paul Goldschmidt at home against LHP Joey Lucchesi. With over $20K remaining it also gives you the reader, flexibility to pivot off those core and mix and match some of your favorite plays if you are not sold on going with either arm or all-in on a Dodgers stack at the core of your build.
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: German Marquez ($17.7K)
SP: Lucas Giolito ($12.7K)
IF: Manny Machado ($9K)
IF: Justin Turner ($8.9K)
IF: Brian Dozier ($8.5K)
OF: Matt Kemp ($8.2K)
OF: Kike’ Hernandez ($8.4K)
OF: J.D. Martinez ($10.4K)
UTIL: David Freese ($6.5K)
UTIL: Paul Goldschmidt ($9.7K)
Slate Overview: Even though we have some flashier spots with guys like Justin Verlander on the mound and offenses in Coors Field, there are simply better spots to attack in my mind on this slate and by dropping down at SP and chasing some high-upside recent performances in Giolito and Marquez, you have basically all the salary you could want to pick the batters you want to build around. We only have a few more weeks to stack the Dodgers my friends and there may not be a worse arm they will face than Mr. Jason Vargas so load up tonight and count all the monies (or tilt with me as I do most times I stack the Dodgers). Good luck all!
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