Tonight’s seven-game slate begins at 7:05 ET with the Nationals hosting Atlanta. The weather looks fairly decent across the board but be sure to double check.
Today’s SPs and 2023 Stats
A quick note on PLV: If you’re curious about its intricacies, check out Nick’s primer. A quick summary: PLV is a quantifier that uses several variables to assess the quality of each individual pitch; the higher the value, the better the pitch. PLA is the ERA equivalent to PLV (the lower, the better).
Gerrit Cole ($12,200 DK, $11,500 FD) is the top pitcher on the board but given that he’s facing the Jays (sixth-lowest team K rate, T-9th in team wOBA) I don’t think you necessarily have to plug him in.
Max Fried ($10,000 DK, $10,600 FD) gets a friendlier draw against the Nats (20th in team wOBA) at a decent discount relative to Cole. Although, the Nats have the second-lowest team K rate, so they’re pesky I guess?
Anyway, Fried tossed a gem about three weeks ago against the Dodgers, so we can feel good about where he is right now after having missed a lot of time earlier this year with a strained forearm.
Going a step lower, Tarik Skubal ($9,600 DK, $10,300 FD) gets a terrific matchup against the A’s (fourth-highest team K rate). Skubal has dominated with a 29.9% K-BB over his last four starts.
Yes, he’s feasted on great matchups but, hey, he gets another one lined up tonight at OAK so no reason to think he can’t keep up the recent success.
Grayson Rodriguez ($8,100 DK, $9,000 FD) is my favorite play of the night on DraftKings. He has a 19.8% K-BB over his last six starts and his pitch quality metrics are through the roof (5.36 PLV). It doesn’t look like his salary has caught up quite yet, so take advantage.
José Berríos is at a weird salary on DK at $8,600. I think I’d rather go down to G-Rod or up to Skubal/Fried. That aside, he’s got a great matchup against the Yankees who are tied with the Royals for the fifth-lowest team wOBA in baseball. It still feels weird typing that.
I want to like Ranger Suárez. I really do. But I just can’t ignore that he has a 1.40 WHIP on the year along with below-average pitch quality metrics (4.87 PLV). He’s a big home favorite (-164 on FD) against the Mets (18th in team wOBA) and he can certainly pay dividends at $7,900 on DK, but I’m not entirely sold either.
It’s probably best to simply cross off Kyle Hendricks ($7,600 DK, $8,400 FD) on most nights given his lack of strikeouts, but there’s certainly a scenario where he could work given the match-up against the Pirates (sixth-lowest team wOBA in baseball).
Pitching against the Tigers has been a theme all year. But is that enough to target Luis Medina? It’s a frightening thought but he’s at least flashed a couple of decent strikeout games (seven K’s in his last start against SD and nine against BOS back on July 7th), so we’ve seen it before. He might work as an SP 2 on DK at $6,600.
Bats
Atlanta could once again blow up the slate against a shaky pitcher in Jake Irvin. They’re a difficult team to stack given their salaries but at the same time, it’s hard to imagine Irvin and the Nats bullpen providing much resistance.
The Phillies are the other high-priced offense that could detonate the slate against the highly combustible left-hander David Peterson and an equally flammable Met bullpen.
Sure, Peterson has stacked up some strikeouts lately but his pitch-quality metrics are below-average (4.83 PLV) and his recent success has come against the Twins and Reds. I’m just not sold that he can do it against a better lineup like the Phillies.
The Guardians haven’t announced an official starter for tonight’s game but either way, the Orioles are a team to put on the list. The big spends are Gunnar Henderson and Adley Rutschman, but if you’re looking for a cheaper bat consider Ryan O’Hearn; his salary remains modest despite his recent hot stretch.
The Tigers get Luis Medina and his 5.56 ERA / 1.55 WHIP. But they don’t really have much that we can get too excited about outside of Kerry Carpenter and Spencer Torkelson.
We’re just five starts into Kyle Harrison’s career, but so far we’ve seen him be up-and-down which you kind of expect from a young rookie. Tonight against the Dodgers in Chavez Ravine doesn’t feel like a soft landing spot for him.
Johan Oviedo has pitched pretty well for the Pirates but he’s also allowed a lot of baserunners (1.36 WHIP) so it’s not hard to imagine the Cubs doing some work tonight.
Emmet Sheehan hasn’t been great in limited action but he won’t pitch that long tonight either. Still, I think both Michael Conforto and Joc Pederson are a little bit interesting given their track records against righties and they’re both cheap, especially Conforto on DK.
A couple of other random darts that caught my eye based on their salary are Jack Suwinski against Hendricks and Met rookie Mark Vientos; he’s been percolating lately and he’s still very cheap.