MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – May 22 – Bounceback SZN
Welcome to the Wednesday 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.
Tuesday’s MLB DFS slate was all about pitching as 5 of the top 7 raw point plays were starting pitchers with Justin Verlander leading the way with 42 fantasy points on the back of 12 K’s against the White Sox. Offensively, the chalk hit again with three of the top scoring bats on the night also being three of the highest owned (20% plus in GPPs) – with Joey Gallo, Nomar Mazara and Gary Sanchez.
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 Pitching Picks:
With an underwhelming and likely chalky four game early slate that will focus on the bats in Texas/Seattle, I am going to turn my attention to a really strong Main Slate where we have some elite pitching and likely a few chalk offenses (cough cough Yankees versus Dan Straily).
This Main Slate feels incredibly similar to last night’s action as we have a clear top tier of aces without any real punt SP2’s option that stand out as great values. Looking back at last night, I thought it was interesting to see the ownership on FantasyDraft in the $25 Home Run GPP, where Justin Verlander was over 50% owned while Caleb Smith was under 10% owned – where it became clear most went with a Verlander/ Spencer Turnbull SP2 combination instead of paying up for two stud arms.
Tonight, it will be interesting to see if the same ownership and builds take place with a similar pitching layout.
Gerrit Cole ($23.1K) gets the same match-up that Brad Peacock (9K’s and 31 FPTS) and Justin Verlander (12 K’s and 43 FPTS) have dominated the last two nights and as a -330 home favorite against a White Sox team with a 2.4 IRT – simply copy and paste everything you wrote/thought about Verlander here yesterday and the same applies.
Where this slate gets interesting to me is really the SP2 decision – as we have Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer both over $20K, facing off against each other in New York. As I mentioned earlier, the double-barrel ace approach was not overly popular yesterday and this feels like a spot where if Verlander was over 50% owned last night, how chalky is Cole going to be? In turn, how much less owned would that make the “pivots” in deGrom and Mad Max?
If Caleb Smith was under 10% last night – is there potential here to get Scherzer/deGrom at single digit ownership? If the answer is yes, then is this a spot you prioritize two big spends at pitcher?
Scherzer ($21.3K) is the more expensive of the two aces in New York, having faced this Mets team twice already this season with 12 K’s and 34 fantasy points in Washington before giving up 4 ER’s in New York and only tallying 18 fantasy points. deGrom ($20.2K) meanwhile has gone for 30+ fantasy points in both previous outings with the Nationals with 28 K’s, 2 walks and only 1 ER allowed but is coming off a brutal outing his last time out against the Marlins where he gave up 6 ER and had -0.15 fantasy points.
So how can we play this? The simple answer would be to eat the Cole chalk and pair him with a low(er) owned Scherzer and deGrom much like we argued last night with JV/Caleb Smith. The other option would be to fade Cole, if we assume 50-60% ownership and lock in both Scherzer and deGrom as our pitchers at low ownership.
Listen the spot for Cole is hard to argue against but couldn’t we have said the same thing for deGrom when he faced the Marlins? Imagine the leverage you would have on the field if Cole struggles and you have Scherzer and deGrom at a fraction of the ownership with every bit the K upside?
From a pure metrics perspective, Scherzer (16% swinging strike rate) and deGrom (15.3%) stand toe to toe with Cole’s 16% mark and the 32% and 30% K rates that Max/Jake have is a reasonable step down from Cole’s 38%.
To be clear, Cole is the right play – the best play – but if his ownership is going to be 5-6x that of Max and deGrom, I think they make for viable GPP pivots and even more so as a pairing on FantasyDraft.
MLB DFS – Building Our Bats:
Another slate and another night where the Astros (versus Ivan Nova) and Yankees (versus Dan Straily) will be clear chalk with IRT’s in the 6+ range. Now to be clear, fading the chalk has been a losing proposition the last two nights when it comes to offense – I know because I have faded it, and lost. However any time you get a slate where two teams stand clearly above the rest in Vegas totals, I think it will result in such concentrated ownership especially with recency bias adding to the do not fade the chalk narrative.
There are a few spots I think we can pivot to including the Red Sox and the Phillies/Cubs with 14 MPH winds blowing out at Wrigley, but I want to go back to the Los Angeles Dodgers today against the Tampa Bay Rays.
I mentioned this in yesterday’s Picks and Pivots how the ownership on offenses facing openers tends to be way lower as DFS players typically pick on opposing starters – ie. everyone jamming in Yankees today because Dan Straily is pitching. This played out exactly as I assumed yesterday where the Dodgers stack was essentially 5% or lower owned as shown below and anytime I can get an offense this talented at a fraction of the ownership of the Yankees or Astros, I want to load up in tournaments.
Tonight, the Dodgers will face off with RHP Ryan Stanek before likely giving way to RHP Yonny Chirinos which makes this a bit more straightforward than last night where a lefty in Jalen Beeks came in after RHP Hunter Wood.
The Dodgers will likely be able to roll out their lefty heavy lineup and they get the added benefits of a DH and playing on the road which mean a full 9 innings of at-bats. The trio of Cody Bellinger, Joc Pederson and Max Muncy all have .270+ ISO marks against RHP since the start of 2018 and this season, guys like Corey Seager and Alex Verdugo both have .200+ marks. It seems likely Matt Beaty will be in the line-up today and unlike last night this will be more than a one at bat affair since he was pinch hit for with David Freese once the lefty came in.
Stanek has given up a .316 ISO and 43% HC rate with a 60% fly ball rate, so it would not shock me to see the Dodgers front load the lefties tonight and it only will continue with Chirinos after him who has given up a 48% HC rate to LHB in 2019.
MLB DFS – Sample Lineup and Slate Overview:
Please note – this sample lineup is meant to be illustrative only and should not be used as a plug and play lineup.
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SP: Max Scherzer
SP: Jacob deGrom
IF: Zack Cozart ($4K)
IF: Yonder Alonso ($5.9K)
IF: Max Muncy
OF: Cody Bellinger
OF: Kike’ Hernandez
OF: Joc Pederson
UTIL: Corey Seager
UTIL: Matt Beaty
Slate Overview: It feels scary to play the Gerrit Cole fade here but if his ownership is going to be 50%-60% or higher, than I am willing to take a stand and pivot off him. The match-up with the White Sox is clearly a good one, but if you have reasonable pivots (which we do) with similar upside, I think siding with Jake or Max (in this case both), then it is a viable build.
Fading the chalk offenses is something I tend to do more often than the chalk pitchers, so I have no issue arguing a fade of Yankees chalk again today when I could potentially get the Dodgers again for 5% or lower ownership against a right-handed heavy Rays bullpen day.
It all comes together with the #FreeSquares – using someone like Zack Cozart ($4k) at near minimum price on FantasyDraft to help you unlock this all.
Well here we go kids – fade the chalk time. Let’s roll.
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