Welcome to the Saturday edition of the DFS Primer! Also, Happy 4th of July weekend! Hopefully you were able to beat all of the insane traffic if you are out of town. After being cooped up at home for the last two years, most of us have the itch to travel. Whether you are enjoying the holiday weekend at your home or some fun destination, we have plenty of MLB action to follow.
As I have done in my previous DFS articles, I will share a table displaying rankings of the pitchers on today’s main slate using six metrics. Here are those metrics.
1) Barrel rate allowed.
2) Percent hard-hit contact allowed.
3) Expected wOBA allowed.
4) Expected ERA.
5) Flyball to groundball ratio.
6) Strike out to bases on ball ratio.
Using such analysis will help you identify the best value for pitchers and determine which stacks to build. Here is the table analyzing all of the starting pitchers for the afternoon slate on DraftKings and FanDuel (lock at 1:05 PM PT). I will avoid the later games since tonight is all about BBQ and fireworks (yes, even on July 2 – just rinse and repeat on July 3 and July 4!).
There is no question that the top 3 pitchers for the afternoon slate are Martin Perez, Dylan Cease, and Logan Webb. Don’t get cute today with your pitcher selection. Maybe Spencer Strider is your #2 pitcher if you are playing DraftKings, but we will need to pay up for quality pitching today. While Perez has demonstrated exceptional control of the strike zone and limited hard contact, the Mets bats worry me. Plus, we all know Ks are King in MLB DFS, especially on FanDuel.
With that said, look no further than Oracle Park in San Francisco, which is one of the ultimate pitcher’s parks in all of baseball with its expansive outfield and cool temperatures. Game time temperature will definitely be below 60 degrees. As much as I love Webb (I’ve been a die-hard Giants fan since the late 80s), I am a bigger fan of money. Cease is your guy for today. If you have had a chance to watch him live, it is a treat. He has amazing command of the strike zone and is on fire right now.
Another reason to roster Cease is that the Giants bats have struggled lately. During the last 7 days, the Giants’ batting average has dipped below the Mendoza line (0.199), and their OPS is a paltry 0.651. They are also whiffing quite a bit: 217 K in their last 24 games. Cease is pitching like a Cy Young candidate this season with a 2.56 ERA and 121 Ks over 81 IP. I expect him to get 6-7 solid innings today with the potential for double-digit Ks and another quality start.
As for the bats, my oh my, the Brewers popped off last night. 19 runs! Will history repeat itself? The Brewers have shown a propensity to score runs in bunches, and right now, we should ride their hot streak. They have five wins in their last 6 games and have not scored fewer than 5 runs in any of those games. Bryse Wilson ranks near the bottom of my analysis with high wOBA and ERA and a terrible K/BB ratio. Get those lefty bats in there for Milwaukee and throw in Adames, who makes the Brewers so much better when he is healthy.
The other stack I like is Philadelphia. Even though they have struggled at times with Bryce Harper on the shelf, they scored 14 runs on Thursday night and earned another win last night. The temperature will be warm in Philadelphia, with a game-time temperature in the mid-80s and the wind blowing out. The Cardinals are throwing a young kid out there who has struggled so far in his four big-league starts. The barrel rate, hard-hit contact %, expected wOBA allowed, and expected ERA are all high. The right-handed power of the Phillies looks good to me, and I would also consider Kyle Schwarber. A 1-2-3-4-5 stack on DraftKings or a 1-2-3-4 stack on FanDuel sounds about right!
Here are some sample lineups for the afternoon games.
DraftKings
P: D. Cease
P: S. Strider
C: J.T. Realmuto
1B: R. Tellez / R. Hoskins
2B: K. Wong
3B: A. Bohm
SS: W. Adames
OF: A. McCutchen
OF: K. Schwarber
OF: N. Castellanos
FanDuel
P: D. Cease
C/1B: R. Hoskins
2B: K. Wong
3B: A. Bohm
SS: W. Adames
OF: A. McCutchen
OF: N. Castellanos
OF: L. Thomas (one-off from Washington)
UTIL: R. Tellez
Good luck today, and let’s see some fireworks today, figuratively with our lineups and literally in your neck of the woods!
Design by J.R. Caines (@JRCainesDesign on Twitter and @caines_design on Instagram)