With an early 1:07 ET afternoon start and only four games on the MLB DFS main slate on both sites, it’s going to be a very short Thursday around the industry. The four games include a handful of interesting playable pitchers at various prices, which should create an exciting environment for tournament play on both DraftKings and FanDuel. With five of the eight starters coming from the upper tiers of talent, the slate could truly go in any direction and it makes sense to get to a spread of all of the primary options on the mound. There are a few obvious targets for bats, but a short slate will also demand rostering hitters against some of the good pitchers, which will hopefully get some lineups away from hyper-concentrated popularity at the plate.
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Note: All analysis is written utilizing available projected lineups as of the early morning, pay close attention to confirmed lineups and adjust accordingly. This article is posted and updated as it is written, so if a game has not been filled in, check back in a few minutes. Update notes are provided as lineups are confirmed to the best of our ability. Still, lineup changes are not typically updated as lock approaches, so stay tuned to official news for any late changes.
MLB DFS: Game by Game Main Slate Strategy Summary – 6/1/23
Milwaukee Brewers (+159/3.27) @ Toronto Blue Jays (-174/4.32)
A pair of high-end starters take the mound in Toronto with Kevin Gausman getting the nod for the hometown Blue Jays and landing, by a couple of points, as our highest-projected starter on the day. Gausman has been mostly excellent this season, the righty has a 3.03 ERA and 2.83 xFIP with a dominant 31.9% strikeout rate and just a 5.7% walk rate. Most of Gausman’s earned runs for the season came in just two ugly starts in which he allowed seven in one and eight in another. Outside of those two games, Gausman allowed three runs once, two runs twice, and one run in his most recent outing, with five scoreless appearances on the year. Gausman is a strong contender for the American League Cy Young Award early in the season, he has been elite over his first 11 starts and 68.1 innings this year and his matchup against the Brewers, while not a pushover, is mostly non-threatening. Milwaukee’s hitters are pushed down the board for stack quality, but it will be important to get to a bit of everything on a slate like this one, if Milwaukee gets to Gausman on a bad day they would be mandatory for unlocking the top of standings in MLB DFS tournaments. Christian Yelich leads off at .251/.344/.398 with a 104 WRC+, seven home runs, and 12 stolen bases for $4,200/$3,400, his ever-declining DraftKings price still has appeal, Yelich should be included in most stacks of Brewers. Owen Miller is rolling this season, over 133 plate appearances he is slashing .331/.368/.508 with a 138 WRC+, he is cheap and has mid-range power and speed with multi-position eligibility on both sites. Rowdy Tellez is the team’s major power bat, the slugger has 12 home runs with a .250 ISO and mashes from the left side. Tellez is not the extreme free-swinger that some may think, he has a 23.9% strikeout rate this year with a 12% walk rate and was at just 20.2% strikeouts with a 10.4% walk rate last year. At $4,200/$3,000 the first baseman is cheap when looking to this team in a bad matchup. William Contreras and Brian Anderson are right-handed veteran bats with moderate power in the heart of the projected lineup, Contreras is the more valuable player on DraftKings at the catcher position if he plays. The backstop has six home runs on the season, Anderson has eight homers but has been sliding further down the quality slope all month. Abraham Toro had a nice game at the minimum for everyone who got there last night, he checks in today at a similar value with a $2,400 price tag on DraftKings and he remains at the minimum on the blue site, with second and third base eligibility across the industry. If he plays and one is building stacks of this lineup he should be included. Tyrone Taylor had power in hitting 17 homers last year but he has been flat at the plate this season, Brice Turang and Joey Wiemer round out the projected lineup.
The home team will be facing Freddy Peralta who is typically very good at capping power and home run upside, though it seems like he has given up home runs each time we have mentioned that trait in recent outings. The righty had rough days in two of his last three starts, first allowing six runs while walking five, giving up a home run, and striking out only four Cardinals hitters in 5.1 innings, which he followed up with an average start before imploding in his most recent turn. Peralta lasted just 2.1 innings against the Giants, striking out four and coughing up two home runs on his way to four earned runs but 10 total runs on eight hits from 18 batters faced in the brief outing. Overall, Peralta is much better than that, of course. The righty has a 4.64 ERA and 4.29 xFIP this season with a 24.2% strikeout rate, last season he pitched to a 3.58 ERA and 3.66 xFIP in 17 starts and 78 innings, and the year before he had a 2.81 ERA and 3.66 xFIP while striking out 33.6%. His strikeout stuff has come down significantly from two years ago and has seen a bit of a dip from last year’s 27.1% but most of those concerns are baked into Peralta’s $8,100/$9,300 pricing in this matchup, he is a viable option for the MLB DFS start on both sites this afternoon. The Blue Jays lineup is in play coming back the other way, but they are showing limited power upside in our model. In last night’s frustrating game the Milwaukee pitching staff neither struck out nor walked a single hitter last night, Toronto was hitting everything hard but just right at defenders, if the Blue Jays see that much contact today they are unlikely to be limited again. George Springer has seven home runs and eight stolen bases and is at exactly league-average for run creation, but the star outfielder has a lot more in the tank than that, he is a good buy at $4,900/$3,100 when going to stacks of Blue Jays. Bo Bichette and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. are stars atop the lineup who are essentially always in play. Bichette has been raking at .329/.366/.521 with 11 home runs and has created runs 47% better than average, Guerrero has slumped a bit for power but will come roaring back soon enough based on what we can see in his contact profile. Brandon Belt took the night off last night but hopefully will be back in the heart of the order as an excellent buy for cheap lefty power, he and Matt Chapman are an excellent inexpensive combination that can mash in the middle of the projected lineup and on the infield corners. Whit Merrifield has tools for both individual production and correlated scoring, he is a good player at a fair price with second base and outfield eligibility on both sites. Daulton Varsho, Kevin Kiermaier, and Tyler Heineman round out the projected lineup. Varsho hit 27 home runs and was a star in Arizona last year but has not been that player so far in Toronto. He does have eight home runs but just a .159 ISO and 79 WRC+ – meanwhile, Lourdes Gurriel Jr. is crushing for the Diamondbacks and is our home run pick for today, and Gabriel Moreno has been turning into a star catcher, Toronto might want a re-do on that deal. Kiermaier continued his hot start at the plate last night, Heineman is a switch-hitting backup catcher who has not hit a Major League home run.
Play: Kevin Gausman, Blue Jays bats/stacks, Freddy Peralta, Brewers bats in that order
Update Notes: the confirmed Brewers lineup runs as expected from 1-5 with Andruw Monasterio stepping in sixth at shortstop for the minimum price on both sites. Monasterio is a middling prospect who is probably heading past his window after turning 26 two days ago. Turang-Taylor-Wiemer rounds out the lineup with Toro disappointingly taking a seat. The Blue Jays confirmed lineup looks mostly as expected, but Varsho is hitting cleanup in place of Belt once again, and Cavan Biggio is in hitting seventh for $2,100/$2,300 with second base and outfield eligibility on the DraftKings slate, he is a second baseman on FanDuel. Biggio has been hitting the ball hard lately, he has four home runs and a 10% barrel rate in 88 plate appearances this year. The run total has come down by a full run since this morning and now sits at 7.5 which drags the implied team total for the Blue Jays from above 5.0 to 4.32.
Philadelphia Phillies (+166/3.66) @ New York Mets (-181/4.94)
The Phillies will be facing Max Scherzer, who needs no introduction in the MLB DFS game space. Scherzer has not quite been on form through most of his 40.2 innings over eight starts this season, his strikeout rate is down to 23.8% from 30.6% last year with his swinging-strike rate dropping by about a point and a half and a four-point dip in his CSW% in the small sample. Scherzer has a 3.54 ERA and 4.76 xFIP and has allowed a bit of power, but he remains Max Scherzer and we have plenty of faith, particularly when he checks in at highly non-Scherzerian pricing of just $8,700/$9,200. The righty has been coming on over his last three starts, he has allowed two runs total in 18 innings while striking out 19 against the Nationals, Guardians, and Rockies (at Coors). In the Coors start, Scherzer went seven innings and allowed six hits with one home run and eight strikeouts. The Phillies are much better than any of those teams, but an underpriced Max Scherzer is an asset against any squad, he should be played with confidence at the discount. Philadelphia bats should be rostered for coverage, but they are not an outstanding option in this matchup. Bryson Stott should be back in the leadoff spot, he is slashing .290/.325/.403 with a 97 WRC+ in 237 plate appearances and is a good correlation play with the team’s power. Trea Turner costs just $5,100/$2,800 and has been mired in a season-long slump. Bryce Harper is raking with a 12.5% barrel rate and a .315/.410/.483 triple-slash while creating runs 41% better than average in 105 plate appearances since his return early this month. Nick Castellanos lands at $4,300/$3,300 in the outfield, he has been productive with the hit tool and was driving the ball well earlier in the year but has cooled somewhat in May. Castellanos is a good buy at his pricing when looking to stacks of Phillies, he has created runs 13% better than average and should be involved at a discount in the middle of the projected lineup. Kyle Schwarber has a team-leading 9.93 in our home run model against Scherzer, who has allowed a 4.27% home run rate on 9.9% barrels in the small sample this year. The lefty slugger is slated to hit fifth for $4,700/$3,000, which is a good price for all the power he provides, but it does come with the .163/.318/.395 triple-slash. Brandon Marsh and Kody Clemens are another pair of capable lefties projected in the bottom of the batting order. Marsh has five home runs in 183 plate appearances, Clemens has four in 78 and they are both well above average for run creation in their opportunities this season. Edmundo Sosa hit his fourth home run of the season last night, he is slashing .261/.282/.420 and can surprise with low-end low-owned power from time to time. Garrett Stubbs closes out the lineup, he is a low-end backup catcher.
The Mets draw one of the day’s better spots with Phillies’ righty Taijuan Walker on the mound. New York comes in with a 5.14-run implied team total that is one of the three totals above 5.0, and one of only four that are above 4.0 on the odd-duck slate. The other teams above 5.0 are Toronto and Arizona, with the Rockies as the only team in the fours. Walker has a 5.57 ERA and 4.61 xFIP with an 18.9% strikeout rate and 10.1% walk rate in 11 starts and 53.1 innings. The righty has his moments, but he has never sustained better than league-average production, and he has been well below average for long stretches, including most of this season. Walker has allowed power, he has a 3.95% home run rate on eight percent barrels and a 40.7% hard-hit rate, his 8.7-degree average launch angle has saved him to some degree; things could have been worse. The Mets lineup has tons of quality, Brandon Nimmo is an excellent leadoff hitter who gets involved in everything, he gets on base at a .379 clip and has been 31% better than average creating runs, but he also has an under-appreciated 48.5% hard-hit rate for the season. Francisco Lindor has 10 home runs and four stolen bases in 245 plate appearances and is sitting one percent above the waterline for run creation while carrying a very good but unspectacular .205 ISO. Lindor is a star who can, and needs to, produce more at the plate, he is priced down for his talent at $4,700/$3,500. Jeff McNeil is a correlated scoring play when he is getting on base. Pete Alonso is one of the league’s best pure power hitters, he has 20 home runs and a massive .314 ISO with a 17.9% barrel rate for a justifiable $5,600/$4,200. Brett Baty is very cheap at $3,200/$2,700 at third base, the rookie has been very good so far with a 51.1% hard-hit rate, he has four home runs in 131 plate appearances but has slipped two percentage points below average for run creation in the small sample. Baty is a good buy in the Mets lineup, fellow rookie Mark Vientos would be if he lands in this spot as well. Starling Marte is slashing .246/.311/.313 with 15 stolen bases and maybe a few minor signs of life in his triple slash in recent games. Daniel Vogelbach, Mark Canha, and Francisco Alvarez round out the projected lineup. Alvarez is by far the most appealing member of the group, the rookie catcher should be back for the afternoon affair after getting the night game off yesterday, he is turning into a star with eight home runs in 117 plate appearances and a .278 ISO with a 134 WRC+. Both Vogelbach and Canha are playable cheap veterans who can still hit one out from time to time.
Play: Max Scherzer, Mets bats/stacks, Phillies bats/stacks in small doses
Update Notes: the Phillies confirmed their lineup in its expected form. The Mets lineup looks as anticipated. The run total is down a half-run to 8.5 which pulls the Mets down to 4.94 implied runs, leaving the Diamondbacks as the only team on the board above the 5.0-run mark.
San Diego Padres (-114/3.89) @ Miami Marlins (+105/3.70)
Southpaw Jesus Luzardo has been mostly excellent in 11 starts and 61.1 innings in 2023. Luzardo has a 26.8% strikeout rate with a 3.67 ERA and 3.93 xFIP while cutting walks from 8.8% to 7.3% for the season. The lefty has an elite 13.7% swinging-strike rate and a 29.5% CSW%. He has given up some premium contact with an 11.1% barrel rate and 89.5 mph of average exit velocity with a 3.07% home run rate. The lefty is facing a beatable Padres squad in a good pitching matchup, his Marlins may not give him the opportunity to chase the win bonus, but a quality start and solid handful of strikeouts are very much in play at $9,100/$10,000. The Padres top-heavy lineup is drawing power against Luzardo to a degree, but much of it is being soaked up by only two hitters, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Juan Soto are both well above our magic number for home runs, while the rest of the team falls below that mark. The two stars in the heart of the lineup are playable in any matchup, they are appropriately priced on DraftKings but a little cheap on FanDuel. Ha-Seong Kim is projected to lead off, he is a mid-range power and speed play. Xander Bogaerts has been lousy through most of May after rolling through the first month of the season, he is priced down at $5,000/$3,100 and has a very long track record of star-caliber play that tells us we are getting a good discount on the player. Brandon Dixon and Jake Cronenworth are mid-range options in the fifth and sixth spots for affordable prices, Cronenworth has disappointed this season after being a productive cog in the machine last year. Nelson Cruz, Austin Nola, Jose Azocar, or anyone else who slips into the lineup would be a much lower-end option who can, and should, be mixed and matched through shares of Padres stacks when going to this team, but they are not appealing options.
The Marlins have been one of baseball’s best teams for run creation against left-handed pitching, but that did not help them last night against Blake Snell who shut them down completely while racking up seven strikeouts in six innings before the bullpen blew a 1-0 lead in the ninth. Miami will see no such upside against righty Joe Musgrove today, the team ranks 24th among baseball’s 30 teams with an 89 WRC+ against right-handed pitching and their .132 ISO sits in a tie for 25th. Musgrove will be making his seventh start after missing the first few weeks of the season with a toe injury, he was slow to get into form but dominated the Yankees over 6.1 with six strikeouts and just one earned run in his last outing and has more than enough talent to wipe these Marlins off the board. Musgrove has a 22.6% strikeout rate and 5.64 ERA with a 4.28 xFIP in the small current-year sample. Last season, the righty threw 181 innings in 30 starts, he had a 2.93 ERA and 3.47 xFIP with a 24.9% strikeout rate. Musgrove projects as our second-best pitching option in the matchup against the Marlins but he costs a mere $7,300/$7,500, which is a mistake price for this pitcher in this spot on both sites. The Marlins can be played back the other way against Musgrove and they should be rostered in full portfolios of lineups, but they make for a lower-end stack in the overall sense. Bryan De La Cruz has been good this season, he is slashing .296/.350/.460 with a 123 WRC+ over 206 plate appearances. Jorge Soler has blasted 17 balls into the seats already this year, he has a .302 ISO and 137 WRC+ in 228 plate appearances. Luis Arraez is a star hitter with a limited amount of power who is a dynamite play for correlated scoring at a fair price. Arraez is slashing .381/.438/.466 and has created runs 50% better than average. Garrett Cooper has a touch of pop on the right side, he has a .148 ISO and five home runs in 158 plate appearances, Jesus Sanchez is projected to be in the lineup, the young lefty started the season strongly with a .310/.380/.563 triple-slash and three home runs with a .254 ISO in his first 79 plate appearances before hitting the injured list, he is cheap at $3,100/$2,500. Jean Segura has been bad this year, Joey Wendle is a low-end hit-and-speed player, Jacob Stallings is a backup catcher, and Garrett Hampson is another hit-and-speed infielder at a cheap price.
Play: Joe Musgrove, Jesus Luzardo, Padres bats/stacks, minor shares of Marlins bats in that order
Update Notes: the Padres have Gary Sanchez in the lineup again this afternoon, he costs $3,400 where catchers are necessary and checks in with all his home run power at the dead minimum as a playable FanDuel piece. Sanchez homered last night and now has one in 14 plate appearances this season, he is playing for his fourth organization in 2023. Azocar and Austin Nola round out the lineup so the Padres will have a two-catcher configuration for DraftKings gamers.
Colorado Rockies (+148/4.24) @ Arizona Diamondbacks (-161/5.37)
The targetable game with two low-end pitchers comes from out West where the Rockies and Diamondbacks will have an afternoon faceoff in the desert. Colorado will be facing righty Zach Davies, who has made three starts and thrown 12.2 innings. Two of his starts came in early April and he was out until returning for 3.1 innings on the 27th in which he struck out three, walked two, and gave up two runs to the Red Sox. Overall, Davies’ season amounts to a 5.68 ERA and 5.24 xFIP in the unfair sample. Looking at a more realistic 134.1 inning sample from last season, we find a 4.09 ERA and 4.58 xFIP with a 17.9% strikeout rate that looks equally targetable. Davies was an even bigger target in 2021. The one issue with throwing bats at this pitcher is the quality on the other side, the Rockies are a low-end squad that struggles even more in road games. As a unit, the team’s active roster is slashing .270/.330/.426 with a 91 WRC+ against right-handed pitching this season. There are a few interesting younger hitters that the team has finally decided to give a look, and the projected lineup features several of them at fair prices. The lineup opens with veterans including Jurickson Profar, who has been bad; a productive Randal Grichuk at a cheap price on both sites; and Ryan McMahon, who has been good for power and hits righties very hard. McMahon is interesting at $4,600/$3,300 when going to Rockies hitters, he has a 13.3% barrel rate and 50% hard-hit rate with eight long balls this season. Elias Diaz has been a highly productive catcher at .321/.376/.494, he has been much better than Kris Bryant this season, the veteran outfielder is slashing a lowly .263/.346/.374 with just a .111 ISO and 87 WRC+. Harold Castro is cheap with multi-position eligibility and a decent hit tool that can provide sneaky correlated scoring, but he is not a premium option. Nolan Jones is one of Colorado’s better prospects at the plate, the corner infielder costs $3,000/$2,700 and has one home run in his 19 plate appearances so far. Brenton Doyle is another interesting young player who offers power from the right side of the plate, and, if he plays, Elehuris Montero would also make for a compelling inexpensive option late in the lineup. Ezequiel Tovar is a young player who was thought of as a good prospect, but he has not been good through most of his 195 plate appearances.
The Diamondbacks are the slate leaders with a 5.37-run implied team total this afternoon in a matchup against Chase Anderson. The veteran righty has also made only three starts this season, though he has thrown 20.2 innings overall with two bullpen appearances earlier this month as he rounded into form. Anderson has just a 12.5% strikeout rate but he has pitched effectively in his three outings, allowing only three earned runs total with one home run, which amounts to a 1.31 ERA, which is where the nice story comes crashing to a halt. Anderson’s 5.11 xFIP is far more telling, that is who this pitcher is, he had a 4.62 xFIP with a 6.38 ERA in seven starts last year, and was at a 5.65 xFIP with a 6.75 ERA in nine starts the year before. Anderson has not pitched much over the past two seasons, there is no real reason to believe in this current minor run of surface-level quality, Diamondbacks bats can be rostered against this pitcher aggressively. Pavin Smith is cheap at $3,300/$2,700 with first base and outfield eligibility, he has five home runs and a 105 WRC+ in 135 opportunities this year. Ketel Marte checks in at a fair $5,400/$3,200 as a high-end second baseman on a short slate. Marte has eight home runs with a .196 ISO and 117 WRC+ and has struck out just 15.9% of the time this season. Corbin Carroll has nine homers and 16 stolen bases with a 141 WRC+ that sits a tiny tick behind the 142 mark held by Lourdes Gurriel Jr. to lead the team. Carroll is an outstanding buy in the outfield for just $5,000/$3,600. Slugger Christian Walker slots in between the two outfielders with his light-tower power. Walker blasted his 12th home run of the season last night, he has a .232 ISO and has created runs six percent better than average but still costs just $4,600/$3,300 at first base, the price is two low on both sites in this spot, Walker seems likely to be crushingly popular today. Gurriel has been a star all season for the Diamondbacks, he is slashing .311/.359/.547 with a .237 ISO and 142 WRC+, and his nine home runs already exceed last year’s total by four in fewer than half the plate appearances. Josh Rojas is a mix-and-match option with a reasonably good hit tool, moderate power, and a bit of speed at a cheap price. Jake McCarthy has eight stolen bases in 90 plate appearances, if he gets on he will be running. Geraldo Perdomo and Jose Herrera close out the lineup, Perdomo had a nice run through the earlier part of the season and has cooled somewhat but is settling in to adequate production overall, Herrera is a backup catcher.
Play: Diamondbacks bats/stacks, Rockies bats/stacks
Update Notes: after decreases in the run totals in two other games, the Diamondbacks are the only team on the board at more than 5.0 implied runs with a 5.36 mark that sits nearly a half-run above the Mets and a full run above the next-closest teams.
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