Daily Fantasy Baseball is in full swing, and whether you play on DraftKings, FanDuel, Yahoo, or Fantasy Draft, this article is designed to help you find the best value plays across the board for today’s slate. These low salary targets are my top players to help you roster your stud bats and pitchers.
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While most of our content is site specific, whether it be for hitting or pitching, this article is going to be different. What I will do here, is evaluate potential value plays for that particular day, across the four major DFS sites.
So the plan of attack here is, first I will highlight my top value plays for Yahoo and Fantasy Draft. I will dig up certain plays that I think fit their scoring systems, and possible flaws in pricing. I will then do the same for FanDuel, and then for DraftKings.
Finally after I break down my favorites from each site specifically, I will then finish up with top overall multi-site value plays. These are the top players viable across the industry, who are in line to out produce their respective salary, no matter what the site. All of these plays are just simply the best value plays that stand out across the industry, regardless of site.
Daily Fantasy Baseball: Top Value Plays – Yahoo!
1B – Justin Bour – Los Angeles Angels – $8
Welp… That’s about the only way to start today. I honestly looked at this main slate and wanted to close my laptop. Pricing is catching up to performance, and the true value plays are now limited to players who probably should be hitting a little better than they are up to this point, but are off to a slow start.
Most of the Angels bats are off to a slow start, and there is little doubt this lineup is struggling with Shohei Ohtani and Justin Upton unavailable, but Justin Bour was brought in here to be a left handed power bat to compliment Mike Trout, and things aren’t going very well up to this point.
Bour is yet to leave the yard, and in fact, has just one hit in his first five games as an Angel. Thankfully his price on Yahoo reflects this, because he isn’t really playable anywhere else besides maybe FanDuel. This guy can still hit bombs, and with gas can Edinson Volquez on the other side for the Rangers tonight, this could be the night he finally breaks out.
SP – Jordan Lyles – Pittsburgh Pirates – $26
This really looks like the type of slate to just pick the cheapest options at pitcher that may get you a win and some strikeouts. Yu Darvish apparently is still a mess after the pre-season hype that he was all set to be back to his dominant form. I bought in to the hype, and it killed me DFS wise for his first start, and all I can think about today on a day where he should be the best option, is those seven walks in three innings last week.
So I am off Darvish today, and I don’t mind Atlanta bats again. Who do I like then you ask? Well nobody truthfully, but the Reds are struggling enough offensively that I will be rolling out Jordan Lyles on Yahoo tonight.
It feels like Lyles has been around awhile if you can remember from his days back with Colorado, but he is still young at just 28-years-old. He was never a household name or anything, but he did have a few decent seasons until some injuries plagued him over the last few years.
Lyles is coming off of a hip injury, but threw almost 100 pitches in a simulated game not too long and felt good so there should be no limits on his outing from what I have read. This pitching is awful today and Lyles is risky, but I think this is the spot to target here.
Daily Fantasy Baseball: Top Value Plays – FanDuel
3B – Jung-Ho Kang – Pittsburgh Pirates – $2,400
Kang finally got a hold of one yesterday, as he connected on his first home run of the year off Cardinals starter Miles Mikolas. He is the Pirates starting third-baseman, but was given a day off on April 1st in favor of lefty Colin Moran, who is now 3-for-4 on the season with a homer. Reason I bring that up is that while I expect Kang to start again, being he is the starter, Moran also has a decent track record against tonight’s Cincinnati starter Tyler Mahle, and could make his way in the lineup.
If Moran does start, he is priced up to $3,200, and I would rather pivot to David Bote or Zack Cozart at that point, but if Kang is in I like targeting a few Pirates. It’s just a small sample size so I doubt it will come up, but Moran is 4-for-5 career off of Mahle.
SP – Matt Harvey – Los Angeles Angels – $6,400
The slate is bad and you should probably play half or less than what you normally play! Full disclaimer before anyone on Twitter calls me out for suggesting to play Matt Harvey tonight. You would think a three game main slate would be a gift to us writers with less to sort through, but let me tell you, when there is no pitching, and people are relying on you to figure out which mediocre pitcher will have the best day, it’s a grind.
For me, I am digging through all the sites at once to find similarities and differences. Today, the only thing I can really prove is that it all depends on where you play on who you should pitch.
I have already stated I can’t trust Darvish after he couldn’t throw a strike last outing, so what I really am attracted to here is the low 3.9 implied run total for Texas. Although Harvey has had his noted past, he seems to have turned a new page with the Angels, and he is way too cheap on FanDuel compared to the other options. This may be the same situation we saw with Padres pitcher Matt Strahm the other night at the EXACT same price. Let’s hope the end result is not the same.
Daily Fantasy Baseball: Top Value Plays – DraftKings
OF – Nick Markakis – Atlanta Braves – $3,500
Lock is going to start an hour earlier over on DraftKings tonight, as they did us a solid and included the Indians/Blue Jays match-up on the main slate. One thing pretty much guarantees, is that Trevor Bauer will be locked in at SP1 for nearly everyone tonight. I think you can go Harvey or Lyles for SP2 today, and my favorite cheap bat here tonight is that of veteran Nick Markakis.
Father time may be catching up with Markakis, but man is he still just too cheap here. Relatively speaking, Markakis is priced at $3,200 on FanDuel, and this price on DK suggests that should be way lower, so someone is wrong here. The Braves will face Yu Darvish, and there is a good chance I will be stacking them up here on DK tonight.
Markakis started the season just 1-for-12 through the first three games, but has gone 3-for-4 with three runs scored in the last two against the Cubs. At $3,500 and with Bauer being a must play, this is nearly a value lock in my opinion.
2B/3B – David Bote – Chicago Cubs – $3,800
On the flip side, the Braves will send left-hander Max Fried to the mound tonight to face the Cubs, and that means we should see David Bote back in the lineup. With third base being so deep with value with guys like Kang and Cozart, the fact that we can use Bote at second base over here on DK is attractive. Especially on a small slate like tonight.
The second-year primary platoon back-up has started three of the five Cubs games thus far this season, and is off to a decent start. He his hitting .364 at 4-for-11, with a double and two runs scored. Whether I end up with him at 2B or 3B is yet to be determined, but he will probably occupy one spot for me tonight.
Daily Fantasy Baseball: Top Value Plays – Across the Industry!
Welcome to the most important, and final page of the article. On most days, certain value plays will line up well on 2 or three, or even all of the sites covered in this article. From the looks of it, I have a piece of every player coming up here on at least two sites in my early lineups, so just because you did not see somebody yet on another site specific slide from earlier, he could be coming up right now.
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SS – Andrelton Simmons – Los Angeles Angels – ($3,900 DK – $2,600 FD – $11 Y!)
So we got below mediocre pitching and just three games, and here we are on Andrelton Simmons again. Let’s be honest, if you are not paying up for Javier Baez today this is easily the worst position across he board. While Dansby Swanson had a nice day yesterday, I would advise that for tournament play as part of a Braves stack. If you are playing cash games on this three game slate, which I certainly would not recommend, Simmons presents the better value.
Like most of the Angels it seems, Simmons is banged up and still likely not 100% healthy. Regardless of that, the options are limited with the injuries to Ohtani and Upton, so Simmons remains in the clean-up role for the time being.
With ample opportunities to drive in runs, Simmons has just three RBI up to this point, and he is just one for his last 12. Despite the poor start, the Angels bats present the best value tonight against Volquez and the Rangers, and Simmons is my default top value to the poor depth at the position as a whole.
OF – Albert Almora Jr. – Chicago Cubs – ($3,600 DK, $2,600 FD, $8 Y!)
Almora got a day off yesterday in the Cubs 6-4 loss to Atlanta, but he did pick up a base-hit in a pinch-hit appearance. It was his first day off as he is now the Cubs primary centerfielder, and one can assume he will be back in the lead off role this evening, with lefty Max Fried on the mound. Almora is cheap across the board, and will likely be a popular go-to today with the limited options and his situation, but this more needed value that will be hard to pass on tonight.
That is all for today’s edition of MLB DFS Top Value Plays. I hope you like the format, as I think this is the best way to talk about which value bats and pitchers to consider, no matter what site you play on.
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