MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – June 13 – It’s Lester Day!
Welcome to the Thursday 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.
Wednesday Night’s MLB DFS slate was dominated by Justin Verlander at the top in the perfect illustration of why K’s are king in DFS. Despite giving up 3 ER on three solo blasts from Braun, Yelich and Moustakas, the Astros ace racked up 15 K’s and at 50% ownership in GPP’s was the key player in setting the cash line on this night.
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 – Thursday Pitching Breakdown:
Thursday’s nine game MLB DFS slate looks like a great one as we have high-end K arms and a game in Coors Field to build around and even better – our friends at FantasyDraft have ANOTHER $400 FREE ROLL for you to get in and build that bankroll!
At first glance on this slate my gut instinct is to pay up for pitching as we have a handful of elite strikeout arms on this slate that we can anchor to with a risky/low ceiling player pool of cheap arms that I am not overly enthused about using as pivots.
Matthew Boyd ($20.8K) is the priciest arm on FantasyDraft who also happens to lead the slate in K rate at 30.5% and comes into the game in top form, racking up over a 32% K rate over the last month of action. His opponent, the Royals, have a 25.2% K rate on the year against LHP which ranks 11th in the league and in his only starts against them in 2019, Boyd racked up 9 K’s on his way to 29.55 fantasy points.
Over the last two weeks, no team in baseball is striking out at a higher rate than the Royals as they lead all of baseball with a 29.2% K rate and during that time frame the Royals have scored a league low 30 runs which when combined with Boyd’s recent form makes this an ideal spot to pay up for the Tigers ace in my opinion.
Jacob deGrom ($20.5K) becomes the logical pivot at this price point off Boyd as he gets an ice-cold Cardinals offense that over the last two weeks has the third highest K rate (26.4%) and has scored only 37 runs which is the third lowest mark in baseball during that time.
deGrom on the season has put up elite numbers against right-handed heavy lineups, sporting a 33.5% K rate against RHB which is nearly 10% higher than his mark against lefties and this St. Louis outside of Carpenter/Wong/Fowler will be entirely right-handed heavy setting deGrom up perfectly for the right side of his splits.
Boyd and deGrom are the only two pitchers over $20K today and I think you can make a strong argument to lock in both and use the $7.3K per batter to build a strong hitting core as their K ability and their opponent’s recent form gives you not only a seemingly “safe” floor but the kind of game environment where the K’s alone could give you a massive ceiling.
MLB DFS – Building Our Bats:
I love playing MLB DFS and I love writing about it each day – I have always looked at this as a place to have fun, a hobby that breaks up the crazy day-to-day most of us have and enjoy one of my favorite sports. I try to stay grounded in fact and stats/analytics when giving my thoughts on a slate and I love pointing out silly narratives to add to the enjoyment – but today my friends, stats are stupid.
No I am not going to dive into FanGraphs here at 5AM EST as I type this up – I am not going to bore you with exit velocities and wOBA’s while you start your day. Instead I am going to break it down like so:
What if I told you there was a world where you could roster some hitters from a team that I routinely love to stack – one that is loaded with power and has the splits in their favor and happens to be facing a fine southpaw who by all accounts seems to be primed for what the kids call regression.
What if I told you that said offense had a IRT nearing 5, and not a single player was over $10k and in fact – three of the top seven in the projected line-up had salaries under $7K.
Guys – it is the Los Angeles Dodgers against Jon Flippin Lester. Literally, it is like a Picks and Pivots dream scenario – if I could somehow include Tim Hardaway Jr. in this article I would (and I think I kind of just did).
After a start to the season that included wizardry and deals with the baseball devil, Mr. Lester has given up 4, 5, 7 and 7 runs in four of his last five starts and since the tables started to turn 5 starts ago on May 18th, Lester has a 5.38 xFIP which is the 3rd worst in baseball among qualified starting pitchers while giving up 2 HR/9 and 40% HC.
This projected Dodgers line-up has a .244 ISO against left-handed pitching this season with 4 of the top 5 projected hitters in the lineup sporting .240+ ISO marks in 2019. So lock in the usual suspects of Chris Taylor, Justin Turner, Enrique Hernandez and David Freese and run it back with the L/L spots of Max Muncy and Cody Bellinger.
If you need salary relief, Kyle Garlick ($4.6k) is expected to draw the start here tonight and is going to be one of, if not the lowest priced starting bat on FantasyDraft tonight.
The beauty of this stack, besides the fact its the Dodgers versus Jon Lester is that the pricing (especially if you include Garlick) makes it incredibly easy to form a #6ManStack and have more than enough salary left over for Boyd and deGrom.
I think you all know where I will be landing tonight – bankroll management be damned!
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: Matthew Boyd
SP: Jacob deGrom
IF: Cody Bellinger
IF: Justin Turner
IF: Max Muncy
OF: Chris Taylor
OF: Enrique Hernandez
OF: Kyle Garlick
UTIL: Jeff McNeil
UTI: Rowdy Tellez
Slate Overview: All kidding aside about my love/hate relationship with Jon Lester – this is a slate where I think paying up for pitching is the ideal route despite the fact we have a Coors Field game available.
deGrom and Boyd not only have the high K rates we look for in DFS, but they are facing two of the most K heavy and ice-cold lineups in baseball right now that puts them in an ideal position to have a ceiling type game.
Locking in both leaves you $7.3K per batter which takes you out of the running for the over-priced Coors bats and maybe the Yankees – but really otherwise, essentially any other stack you want can fit within this build price wise including the Dodgers who seem entirely too cheap considering the splits advantage and recent form of Lester.
I will be back on Monday with Picks and Pivots – to all the Dads out there – Happy Father’s Day – enjoy your weekend and I hope you win all the money tonight with as many Dodgers as your site of choice will allow.
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