MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – Sunday, April 14 – Sunday Funday!
Welcome to the Sunday 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 fantasy baseball 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.
Saturday’s Early Slate was not surprisingly dominated by Blake Snell who put up a slate leading 30 fantasy points in a 9 K outing against Toronto, while Chris Archer was not far behind with 28 FPTS and 9 K’s of his own against the Nationals while the top hitting duo was the unlikely pairing of Christian Vazquez and Chris Davis, who finally broke out of his slump in a big way against the Red Sox.
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 – Sunday Slate Pitching:
Happy Sunday all – we get an eight game Main Slate on FantasyDraft today that starts at 1:05PM EST and could very quickly become a seven game slate with snow expected at Wrigley Field which likely takes the Cubs/Angels players out of our player pool.
Even with a small(er) slate on tap, it is one loaded with pitching options with a handful of elite K arms all priced at the top of the player pool.
Max Scherzer ($20.7K) is the top arm on the slate by every conceivable metric – his 34.8% K rate and 16% swinging strike rate top all pitching options and the price point just over $20K seemingly takes into account the low K line-up of the Pirates. Mad Max only had one start in 2018 against the Pirates and did is usual Scherzer things – going for 27 FPTS with 8 K’s in 6 innings. I am not going to say Scherzer is a must have on this slate because we have other cheaper pivots, but his combination of safety and upside make him the best SP1 if you can afford it.
Jose Berrios ($19.6K) is the second most expensive arm available, at home versus the Detroit Tigers as a massive -210 favorite. Berrios throughout his career has thrived at home, with an ERA 2 full runs lower and a K rate of 26% which is a 6% increase over his road metrics. In his only home start against the Tigers last season, Berrios dropped 33 FPTS on the back of 9 K’s in 8 innings of work. With 40 degree temperatures and the wind blowing in, Berrios looked like a rock solid option either alongside Scherzer or as an SP1 pivot.
Corey Kluber and Charlie Morton ($18.8K) and ($18.6K) sit just below Scherzer/Berrios and from a metrics perspective have the elite K rate and swinging strike rate to make them viable pivots if you need the salary savings. Morton gets the far more appealing match-up against the Blue Jays as he takes his 2019 33% K rate to the mound against one of the worst lineups in baseball so far this season.
This season, we have seen pitchers just destroy this Blue Jays team, with 5 pitchers going for 30+ fantasy points against them including Blake Snell, Mike Clevinger, Trevor Bauer, Carlos Carrasco and the Orioles ace David Hess. Morton faced the Blue Jays once last season, and went off for 42 FPTS with 13K’s in 7 shutout innings.
If there is one SP2 that interests me in the mid-low range it is Kluber’s opponent, Jakob Junis ($14.9K) who brings his 28.2% K rate and 12% swinging strike rate in 2019 to the mound against a weak Indians line-up. Junis has struck out at least 6 batters in each of his first three starts and this Indians projected line-up has a 27% K rate against RHP since the start of 2018.
MLB DFS – Build Around Boston:
With the context that I want to pay up for two arms on this slate – likely some mixture of Scherzer/Berrios/Morton – it may seem like the high-dollar stacks will be out of our price range but the pricing on FantasyDraft looks to be a bit softer today with some punt plays littered throughout the slate that make it possible to stack the best offenses with the best arms.
Now I will say this – if Chris Davis ($4.2K) is back in the Orioles line-up today, you just plug him right back in. I know there is the potential for him to sit with a lefty on the hill, but Davis actually has strong career numbers against Price so the Orioles could opt to ride his hot bat again here today.
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The Red Sox once again have a 6+ IRT at home in Fenway and although they failed to come through yesterday, there is every reason to go right back to the well against LHP John Means. This Boston team is loaded with right-handed power that feasts on lefties with Mookie Betts and J.D. Martinez sporting .300+ ISO marks against southpaws since the start of 2018. Steve Pearce ($7.4K) is one of the best value plays on the slate hitting in the heart of this Red Sox order with a .240 ISO mark of his own. We now have the Red Sox line-up with Dustin Pedroia leading off – this 1-4 stack is going to be super popular with the value of Pedroia and Pearce wrapped around Mookie and JD but it makes for a scary fade.
The Yankees have the second highest IRT at home against LHP Carlos Rodon and will have to take on the heart of the Yankee lineup that has seen its price points come down to affordable levels. Aaron Judge ($9K) and Gleyber Torres($8.3K) have .275+ ISO marks against LHP since the start of 2018 while Luke Voit ($8.5K) has a massive .367 ISO mark versus RHP.
Now it may seem like pairing two arms with these 3 man power stacks is impossible in a salary cap world but it all comes down to what value punts we get. For example – if you play these six batters with a Morton/Berrios combination – you would have $4.7K per batter for the last two spots on your roster. Sunday’s are always the perfect time for back-ups to get spot starts so if we can find a Chris Davis or a punt value option as a one-off, it really unlocks a path to a major stars and scrubs build. If you do not play Morton, my man Juan Bond, makes a great case for some of the Blue Jays bats in his Bargain Bin piece today.
Keep an eye on lineups and adjust accordingly – this is a day where I think you pay up for two top arms and shoehorn in as much of the Red Sox and Yankees bats as you can. Come on Orioles – do us a solid and give us another free square Chris Davis day!
Happy Sunday all!
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