The gargantuan 15-game Tuesday main slate has a bit of something for everyone, including the Dodgers favored by two touchdowns at Coors Field. The slate is too big to write a detailed intro for, we will run out of time prior to lock, but there is a wealth of pitching and plenty of potential for offense even outside of Colorado with 30 teams in action.
Don’t miss our new Stack Suggestions feature and our Power Index for more on the top opportunities at the plate tonight.
Join us at 4:15 pm ET for the MLB DFS Lineup Card Show and a full game-by-game breakdown:
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 Snapshot – 6/27/23
Cincinnati Reds (+125/3.99) @ Baltimore Orioles (-136/4.61)
The first game on the slate wastes no time diving right into the compelling action with a matchup between two hotshot young squads that are developing into contenders in front of our eyes in 2023. The Reds and Orioles are both suddenly loaded with young talent and both teams have more premium young players coming as one baseball generation transitions into the next. The Reds have lost a few games in a row after their big win streak, but they are a fun and talented squad and they come at fair prices on both DFS sites. Cincinnati is facing righty Tyler Wells, who costs $8,400/$9,200 and checks in with a mid-range projection in our pitching model. Wells has been good this year, he has a 3.22 ERA and 4.11 xFIP with a 26.3% strikeout rate over 86.2 innings in 14 starts. Wells has walked just 5.7% and has a microscopic 0.89 WHIP for the season, he is very good at avoiding trouble and has the talent to pitch his way out of the rare jam. For his fair prices, Wells is a good consideration for value shares on the DraftKings slate as an SP2, he is awkwardly priced on the huge FanDuel slate, and several premium options project higher for similar prices. The projected Reds lineup opens with TJ Friedl who has four home runs and 12 stolen bases with a 123 WRC+ this season with a sturdy triple-slash. Friedl is a good correlation piece in stacks for $4,400/$3,000 ahead of emerging star Matt McLain, who has five home runs and four steals in 176 opportunities while slashing .317/.375/.528 and creating runs 38% better than average since his promotion. Jonathan India if cheap at $4,800/$3,300, he has 10 home runs and a dozen stolen bases in 349 plate appearances as one of the team’s more experienced options. Elly De La Cruz lands at $5,800/$4,700 and is once again the most expensive position player on FanDuel. De La Cruz has three home runs and eight stolen bases and has created runs 45% better than average in his 80 plate appearances while also striking out 30% of the time. Jake Fraley has good power from the left side with 11 home runs in his ledger for the season, Joey Votto joins him as another lefty thumper late in the lineup. Votto has three home runs in his 23 plate appearances since returning from injury, the grizzled veteran can still make contact with the best of them and has an elite eye at the plate. Votto costs just $5,100/$3,100 at first base and has a 9.05 in our home run model. Spencer Steer has 12 home runs and eight stolen bases with a .211 ISO and a 40.4% hard-hit rate but costs just $4,800/$3,300 with eligibility at first base and in the outfield. Finally, Will Benson and Tyler Stephenson round out the lineup as mix-in options.
The Orioles are facing outstanding young lefty Andrew Abbott who has made four starts and covered 23.2 innings in the Show. Abbott is a highly regarded prospect who has pitched to a 1.14 ERA with a 23.9% strikeout rate in his first four outings, though his 4.83 xFIP tells a much different story than the ERA. Abbott is talented, but he is not going to pitch this far above his head for very long, he has allowed a 44.3% hard-hit rate and 9.8% barrel rate with 91.5 mph of exit velocity and a 3.26% home run rate in the tiny sample and has walked 9.8% of opposing hitters. The lefty has benefitted from a .190 batting average on balls in play by opponents in his four starts, which is how his WHIP sits at just 0.97 despite all the walks. Abbott is good, but his price is up at $10,200 on the FanDuel slate, he is a far more playable option for $8,600 on DraftKings. The Orioles lineup should have Austin Hays up top again, which is the new trend against southpaws. Hays has been very good this year, he is slashing .319/.357/.510 with eight home runs while creating runs 39% better than average over 283 chances. Adley Rutschman is a premium backstop who copies the form of another top-end catcher, Will Smith from the Dodgers, in avoiding strikeouts while hitting for a strong triple-slash and good power. Rutschman is not yet Smith at the plate, but the trend lines are there and the hitter is an outstanding positional option for MLB DFS when stacking Orioles hitters. Anthony Santander is cheap at $4,200/$3,200, he has 14 home runs and a .227 ISO and has created runs 30% better than average this season. Santander is just one of the players that the sites seem to agree to never price appropriately regardless of what he does on the field. Aaron Hicks hitting cleanup in 2023, what a world. Hicks has been effective since arriving in Baltimore, his season line sits at .235/.333/.397 with five home runs and a 107 WRC+ in 156 plate appearances. The outfielder is still cheap, $2,400 on either site is probably the right price long-term but in the current form Hicks could be more expensive, he will be popular in Orioles stacks at these prices in this spot in the lineup. Ramon Urias, Gunnar Henderson, and Jordan Westburg are an enviable group in the infield, for our purposes the two top prospects and the quality veteran can be mixed and matched in a variety of combinations. Urias has eligibility at first and third base on DraftKings and fills second and third base on FanDuel for $2,700/$2,500, Henderson has eligibility at third base and shortstop for $4,700/$3,200, and the hot call-up of this week, Westburg, slots into shortstop for just $2,000/$2,600. That DraftKings did not raise the price of one of baseball’s top prospects at a premium position is laughable, Westburg is a piece of value once again tonight. Ryan McKenna and Jorge Mateo round out the projected lineup in low-end form, Mateo crashed and burned after a hot April, he has 21 stolen bases on the year and not much else.
Play: mid-range value on all four corners, Reds bats/stacks, Orioles bats/stacks, Andrew Abbott, Tyler Wells in that order
Update Notes:
San Diego Padres (-183/5.24) @ Pittsburgh Pirates (+167/3.87)
The scuffling Padres are in Pittsburgh for a good get-right series that opens with veteran lefty Rich Hill on the mound for the home team. Hill has made 15 starts and thrown 83 innings this season and there were only two or three times we would have wanted him in an MLB DFS lineup. Hill has a 4.34 ERA and 4.52 xFIP with a 21.1% strikeout rate and 8.6% walk rate while allowing 10.8% barrels and a 3.06% home run rate on 40.6% hard hits. Hill is not drawing a strong projection at $6,300/$8,500, he would be a minor dart throw on the DraftKings slate in a bad spot, the FanDuel price is out of line for the matchup. The Padres lineup is loaded with talent through the top half but they have not come together on the field at all this season and seem to take turns struggling. The projected lineup opens with Ha-Seong Kim, who has eight home runs and 13 stolen bases as a moderately productive source of counting stats and correlated scoring for cheap prices. Kim costs $4,300/$3,000 and has eligibility at second or third base on the blue site. Fernando Tatis Jr. has a 12.58 in our home run model with 15 in the books already this season. Tatis has a .257 ISO and has created runs 46% better than average in 269 plate appearances, he is a superstar by any definition. Juan Soto costs $6,200/$3,700 in the outfield, his FanDuel price is too low. Soto has 14 home runs and is slashing .273/.425/.502 with a 156 WRC+ over 341 plate appearances, he is one of baseball’s best hitters and has a 12.6% barrel rate and 60.1% hard-hit rate, both of which lead the team. Manna Machado remains underpriced at $5,900/$3,300. The third baseman has not been elite at the plate this season, he has nine home runs and a 94 WRC+ in 265 plate appearances but should be in most Padres stacks, the turn is coming for the veteran star. Xander Bogaerts is slashing .256/.341/.389 with a 106 WRC+ that has been supported by his on-base skills in recent weeks. Bogaerts is another cheap star in the Padres lineup, he should be included when rostering this team. Gary Sanchez has seven home runs in 93 plate appearances and is seeing regular action with the Padres, he has all world power when he connects and should be a good mix-in option in Padres stacks for $4,200/$2,900. Sanchez has particular value where catchers are required and he has a 7.77 in our home run model that looks like a jackpot. Jake Cronenworth, Nelson Cruz, and Trent Grisham are mix-and-match options, Cronenworth can provide correlated scoring with moderate power and speed, Cruz is formerly a must-play against lefties and has certainly seen a lot of Hill over the years, and Grisham is another veteran with infrequent quality.
The Pirates had a fun start to the year but have not been that team for several weeks, they are also without their best player with Bryan Reynolds still shelved with an injury. The Pirates are facing Yu Darvish, a sturdy right-handed veteran who has thrown 80 innings in 14 starts in 2023. Darvish is perhaps not his ace-caliber former self, but he has a fairly significant ceiling and has not been bad by any means this year. The righty has a 4.84 ERA but a 3.72 xFIP and a 25.7% strikeout rate with a 7.6% walk rate, he has induced an 11.0% swinging-strike rate and has a 29.7% CSW% that looks very similar to his numbers from last year. Darvish costs just $8,100/$9,300, he is a bargain option on both sites who will probably not be as popular as his talent and the matchup warrant. The Pirates are a low-end stacking option that ranks 23rd on our board of 30 teams by projection today. Pittsburgh is a thin contrarian play at best, those looking to roster Pirates will be looking at a projected lineup that opens with Ji-Hwan Bae, who has 20 stolen bases in 230 plate appearances but not much else with a 72 WRC+ on the season. Andrew McCutchen has nine home runs and nine stolen bases, but that was also true in late May. McCutchen has gone cold after a great start to the season, he now sits at .271/.394/.431 with a 129 WRC+ that is supported by his still-excellent ability to get on base. The veteran outfielder is striking out just 19.9% of the time and walking at a 17% clip. Josh Palacios, Carlos Santana, and Ke’Bryan Hayes are not exactly a modern-day Murderer’s Row. Palacios has created runs 23% below average in his 77 plate appearances, Santana has just six home runs and an 86 WRC+ in his 289 chances, and Hayes is at .254/.290/.397 with five home runs and eight stolen bases but an 84 WRC+ in 303 plate appearances. Jack Suwinski and Henry Davis are interesting options down the lineup, Suwinski is the team’s best power hitter, he has 15 long balls on the season. Davis is a top-end rookie who slots into the outfield for $2,200 on DraftKings and fills outfield or catcher for $2,400 on FanDuel. Davis has a home run and a stolen base in his 28 plate appearances, he profiles for good mid-teens power and 20+ stolen bases in a full season. Tucupita Marcano and Austin Hedges round out the projected lineup as mix-in options if getting carried away with Pirates stacks in a bad spot.
Play: Padres bats/stacks, Yu Darvish
Update Notes: Darvish was scratched, Reiss Knehr will make this start for the Padres
San Francisco Giants (+149/3.78) @ Toronto Blue Jays (-163/4.82)
The rolling Giants are facing Kevin Gausman in what should be a highly competitive fun game in Toronto. The right-handed Blue Jays ace has been mostly excellent this season, he has a 3.10 ERA and 2.93 xFIP with a 31.5% strikeout rate over 98.2 innings and 16 starts. Gausman has allowed a 10% barrel rate and 45% hard hits with 90 mph of exit velocity but it has not really hurt him at just 2.23% home runs, and he has been excellent at limiting the damage any power causes by keeping runners off of the basepaths. The righty has a 6.2% walk rate and 1.16 WHIP and has induced a 12.5% swinging-strike rate with a 29.3% CSW%. After rocking his way through a dozen starts, Gausman hit the skids a bit in his last three outings, he went just 4.2 innings while allowing six runs on seven hits while striking out just four and walking four against the Twins on the 11th, then had a better game against the Rangers in allowing just one run on a solo homer and four hits but striking out just four in six innings on the 16th, and finally followed up with a six-inning six-strikeout outing in which he faced 27 Marlins hitters and allowed three runs on eight hits and a walk. Gausman has allowed more than three runs just three times this season, the six-run start against the Twins, an eight-run outing against the Red Sox back in early May, and a seven-run game against the Astros in mid-April, otherwise, he has been reliable for at least six innings and a good shot at a win and quality start bonus with upside for strikeouts. The projected lineup for San Francisco has a 23.1% strikeout rate for the season, Gausman has the talent to post a strong score in this spot and he projects as one of our top overall pitching options on a very deep slate for $11,000 on both sites. The Giants lineup opens with LaMonte Wade Jr. who hits from the left side and has outstanding numbers for someone who costs just $4,100/$3,200. Wade is far too cheap, he has a 147 WRC+ with nine home runs and a .416 on-base percentage this season. The first baseman is involved in the offense regularly and he hits the ball with authority when he makes contact to the tune of a 10.1% barrel rate and 43.3% hard hits. Thairo Estrada is not a tremendous power hitter but he has nine home runs this year and hit 14 last season while adding excellent stolen base upside and a good nose for getting on base. Estrada has 17 stolen bases and has created runs 13% better than average this season and he costs just $5,600/$3,400. Joc Pederson has big left-handed power in a platoon role, he has eight home runs and a .230 ISO in 166 plate appearances this season. JD Davis costs $4,100/$2,900 which is another very low price at which to find a player who has created runs 29% better than average while hitting 10 home runs in 276 plate appearances. Davis is not a star but he is a rock-solid regular who deserves a higher price tag. Michael Conforto has 12 home runs and a 111 WRC+ with a 9.6% barrel rate and 43.1% hard-hit rate, the lefty masher costs $4,000/$3,100 in a low-priced Giants stack. Blake Sabol, Patrick Bailey, Brandon Crawford, and Luis Matos round out the projected lineup. Sabol has seven home runs and a 104 WRC+ for cheap prices with catcher eligibility where it matters. Bailey is another catcher who has been productive at .323/.352/.535 with a .212 ISO and 140 WRC+ in 107 plate appearances. Crawford is a veteran with lefty pop at shortstop and Matos is a highly-regarded rookie who profiles well for his hit tool and speed.
The Blue Jays are facing opener Ryan Walker who will be followed (probably) by bulk reliever Alex Wood, a lefty who has a fairly successful track record in the Show. Walker will be on the mound for an inning at most and will try to get through the elite top of the Toronto lineup. Wood takes over in the second to change things up, the southpaw has a 20.5% strikeout rate and 11.4% walk rate in nine starts and 38.1 innings. Wood has not been good this season with a 5.17 ERA and an identical xFIP as well as a 43.5% hard-hit rate with 90.9 mph of exit velocity. The lefty had a 23.6% strikeout rate and 3.41 xFIP in 130.2 innings and 26 starts last year and a 26% strikeout rate with a 3.44 xFIP in 26 starts in 2021, there is a bit of potential for the starter in his bulk relief role at $6,100, but we are not fans of the uncertain and the Giants have played games with this bulk relief role recently. The Blue Jays lineup is projected as our eighth-best stack for fantasy points but they come at a premium on both sites. George Springer costs $5,600/$3,400, he has turned things around effectively and sits at .265/.330/.411 with a 108 WRC+, 11 home runs, and 12 stolen bases in 333 plate appearances that suddenly look a lot more like George Springer. Whit Merrifield climbs the lineup in this matchup if we start the game with Wood on the hill, but he may end up later in the lineup given the right-handed opener. Either way, Merrifield makes for a good correlated scoring option with his sturdy hit tool and speed on the basepaths, for $4,100/$2,900 he is a good option at second base or in the outfield. Bo Bichette and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. are the team’s stars, the shortstop has a 137 WRC+ with 14 home runs and a .318/.348/.508 triple-slash and Guerrero has 11 home runs and a 125 WRC+ despite a bit of a dip in production in his triple-slash and ISO this season. Guerrero seems to have been the victim of misfortune when it comes to his ISO, he has a massive 13.3% barrel rate and 56.5% hard-hit rate that speak to far more power at the plate and we know that is the case from seasons past. Matt Chapman, Danny Jansen, Daulton Varsho, Santiago Espinal, and Ernie Clement round out the projected lineup. Chapman, Jansen, and Varsho are all highly playable options for power at their positions. Chapman and Jansen both have 10 home runs and Varsho has 12 but only Chapman is above average for run creation at his terrific 124 WRC+ mark. Espinal and Clement are bolt-on options late in the lineup for cheap prices and no ownership.
Play: Kevin Gausman, Blue Jays bats/stacks as a good mid-level option
Update Notes:
Miami Marlins (+112/4.60) @ Boston Red Sox (-121/5.00)
The matchup in Boston is very interesting on the board in Vegas tonight. The Marlins and Red Sox will square off with effective pitchers on the mound on both sides, but if this were last year we would be talking about the ace on the mound for the visiting team from Miami and a Boston run total that was suppressed. In 2023, the Red Sox are drawing a 5.0-run implied total against last year’s Cy Young Award winner. Boston is favored in a contest in which they will have effective right-handed starter Garrett Whitlock on the mound, though they should have saved him to face Braxton Garrett in a duel for the name. Whitlock has pitched to a 4.50 ERA and 3.92 xFIP with a 21% strikeout rate in eight starts and 46 innings this season. He has a terrific 13.3% swinging-strike rate and 30.6% CSW% that are suggestive of a return to his 26.4% strikeout rate of last year, if not the 27.2% that he posted from the bullpen in 2021. Whitlock has worked deeper into games as his season has progressed, he has pitched in the seventh inning in each of his last three starts, completing it in the two most recent outings while striking out six Twins but allowing four runs on eight hits and striking out seven Rockies in a six-hit two-run affair. Whitlock has some upside in a good-not-great matchup against the Marlins. Miami has been frisky this year but most of the team’s quality comes from the top half of the lineup, the bottom end leaves a lot to be desired and should help boost Whitlock’s opportunity on the mound. For $7,100/$8,600 the Red Sox starter is definitely a consideration on the DraftKings slate as an SP2 if not as a sole starter on FanDuel. Luis Arraez is slashing .399/.451/.493 with a .094 ISO and 161 WRC+. In a sport where a 30% success rate gets you to the Hall of Fame, Arraez is getting on base nearly half the time. The second baseman is an outstanding value at $5,100/$3,200, he provides excellent correlated scoring potential with the second hitter in the lineup, Jorge Soler. The slugging outfielder has 21 home runs and a .277 ISO while creating runs 35% better than average and driving the Marlins’ offense this season. Soler has a 16.5% barrel rate and 42.5% hard-hit rate for the season and has struck out just 23% of the time in a big leap from last year’s 29.4%. Bryan De La Cruz has eight home runs and a 107 WRC+ in a strong season, his 308 plate appearances have been valuable for MLB DFS but he costs just $3,900/$2,800. Jesus Sanchez is another cheap outfielder at $3,100/$2,800, he has six home runs and a 112 WRC+ in 163 plate appearances but he has been lousy since his return to action. For the month of June, Sanchez is slashing .195/.262/.351 with a .156 ISO and 69 WRC+. The young left-handed hitter will have ups and downs but he is a good buy in Marlins stacks. The projected lineup has Garrett Cooper hitting fifth with returning Jazz Chisholm Jr., arguably the team’s best player, hitting sixth. The batting order is subject to change, it would not surprise to see Chisholm hitting third with De La Cruz fifth and Cooper sixth. In any configuration, Chisholm is the better option between the two, Cooper has nine home runs and a 90 WRC+ for the season, and Chisholm has seven with a 90 WRC+ in 71 fewer plate appearances. Jean Segura has been awful all season, Joey Wendle is a mix-in with an 83 WRC+ in 130 plate appearances this year and an 87 in 371 tries last year, and Jacob Stallings is a low-end catcher option.
The Red Sox are facing Sandy Alcantara who has struggled through 95.2 innings in 15 starts in 2023. Alcantara is still working deep into most games but he has run into big innings nearly every time out this season and his already low strikeout totals have dipped below league average this season. As outstanding as he was in 2022, Alcantara still had just a 23.4% strikeout rate, he was a bit of a compiler in the strikeout department while posting excellent ratios and winning ballgames in style. The righty has dropped to a 19.4% strikeout rate with a 7.2% walk rate which is a jump from last season’s 5.6% mark. His swinging-strike rate is in line but his CSW% has dropped by about a point year over year. Alcantara has allowed a 6.2% barrel rate and 1.99% home run rate and he has a 5.08 ERA with a 4.18 xFIP this season. The righty has been a victim of some misfortune, opposing hitters have a .293 BABIP against him after sitting at just .262 last season, but part of that is due to a spike from 38.5% hard hits to 41.6% and a jump from 87.8 mph of exit velocity to 89.3. Alcantara has not been entirely awful on the mound this season, there is more than enough talent to dominate this lineup and win a slate, but he has been far from last season’s form overall. The struggles are baked into the righty’s pricing at this point, Alcantara costs just $7,900/$8,400 tonight and has to be in play at least as a tournament option, despite the lofty run totals and bad ballpark. The Red Sox productive lineup has five hitters who have been above average for run creation this season, they are the exact five you are expecting. At a 99 WRC+ for the season, rookie Triston Casas slips just below the waterline, but he is getting close to the surface as another productive bat behind the team’s top five, which would be a big help. Casas already makes very good contact when he connects, he has a 14.3% barrel rate and 45.5% hard-hit mark with nine home runs and a .182 ISO in 259 plate appearances and he also draws walks at a 14.3% clip. Things are going to come together for Casas in a hurry at some point this season, there is too much in his statistical output for it to not happen, he will have a big week with four or five home runs sometime in the next month and won’t look back from that point onward. The productive top five in the lineup includes excellent leadoff man Alex Verdugo, who has created runs 30% better than average in 318 opportunities; Justin Turner who has a 120 WRC+ and 11 home runs but costs just $4,600/$3,400; Masataka Yoshida who has been tremendous in his first year in MLB with a 130 WRC+, eight home runs, and a .299/.372/.466 triple-slash in 301 plate appearances; star third baseman Rafael Devers who leads the team with 18 home runs; and slugger Adam Duvall who has a 6.72 and sits second on the team in our home run model. The bottom third of the lineup is comprised of Christian Arroyo, David Hamilton, and Connor Wong. The last name on that list is our preferred Red Sox catcher, Wong has a 10.1% barrel rate and six home runs in 188 plate appearances and is rarely popular. If column favorite Bobby Dalbec is in the Red Sox lineup he can be in yours.
Play: Garrett Whitlock, Red Sox bats/stacks, Marlins bats/stacks, Sandy Alcantara value; all in moderate to small portions.
Update Notes:
Milwaukee Brewers (+133/4.15) @ New York Mets (-144/4.95)
Note: there is a fair amount of bad weather in the area with storms forecast through the evening, keep a weather eye on the weather in Queens.
The Brewers and Mets are facing off on another muggy rainy day in the New York area in a game that may not be played. Milwaukee will be facing southpaw David Peterson, who slots in with a mid-board projection in our pitching model for $6,600/$7,300. Peterson has made eight starts and thrown 39 innings in the Show in 2023 but has been pitching in AAA since mid-May. The lefty had an atrocious 8.08 ERA in the short sample before his demotion, but the Mets were probably unfairly quick on the trigger, his 3.42 xFIP is a far more honest and normal number for a pitcher who has been good at the Major League level already in his short career. Peterson had a 24.7% strikeout rate and 7.7% walk rate while inducing 12.2% swinging strikes and a 29.2% CSW%. He allowed a bit too much premium contact in the eight starts earlier in the season with a 9.8% barrel rate and 43.4% hard hits amounting to a 4.40% home run rate, but that is happenstance in a small sample. In 105.2 innings and 19 starts last year, Peterson allowed a 7.7% barrel rate and 41.4% hard hits with a 2.42% home run rate while striking out 27.8% with a 12.8% swinging-strike rate. He pitched to a 3.83 ERA and 3.31 xFIP last season and had a 3.93 xFIP with a 24% strikeout rate in 15 starts and 66.2 innings in 2021. Peterson belongs at the MLB level, the Mets do not have enough pitching depth to be so reactionary with a young starter who had a few rough games but has already proven himself. Peterson is in play as an SP2 on DraftKings and his $7,300 price has appeal on FanDuel, he is fully stretched out and facing a team with a 24.4% aggregate strikeout rate for the season. Against lefties, the Brewers’ strikeout rate climbs to 26.2%, the fifth-worst rate in the league, and their WRC+ sits at 92. This is a good spot, Peterson is fully stretched out and has the talent to book six clean innings while finding strikeouts for a cheap price. Milwaukee’s lineup opens with Owen Miller when the team faces a southpaw. Miller has a 97 WRC+ for the season with four home runs and nine stolen bases at affordable prices. William Contreras has eight home runs and a 107 WRC+ with a .177 ISO and a 47% hard-hit rate for $4,300/$2,900 behind the plate. Willy Adames is a threatening power hitter on the right side as an affordable shortstop. Adames has blasted a dozen home runs in 288 plate appearances but is also slashing just .206/.287/.379. Christian Yelich drops to the cleanup spot against same-handed pitching, he has a 68 WRC+ with a .082 ISO against fellow lefties this year which is another tick in Peterson’s favor on the pro/con list. Brian Anderson and Luis Urias have power on the right side but they are inconsistent for contact and have been mostly lousy or absent through 2023. Urias is the better of the two players, he hit 23 home runs two years ago and fills multiple positions for a cheap price. Blake Perkins, Andruw Monasterio, and Joey Wiemer are viable options late in the lineup in Brewers stacks, they are not outstanding options and only Perkins is above average for run creation in a small sample of 54 plate appearances, but there is a bit of talent and potential for counting stats if nothing else. Wiemer has 11 home runs and 10 steals this season but is slashing .214/.279/.410 overall, Perkins is very cheap and has two home runs and two steals in his limited opportunities, and Monasterio has multi-position eligibility that no one will play at low prices.
The Mets are facing enigmatic Julio Teheran who should not be as good as he has been so far in 2023. Teheran missed most of the last two seasons and has not been a relevant MLB pitcher since 2019. The righty has made six starts and thrown 35.1 innings with a 17.6% strikeout rate and 6.1% walk rate but a stellar 1.53 ERA. His xFIP is the truthful number at 4.75. Teheran has allowed just 2.29% home runs in the tiny sample and hitters have not managed much premium contact, but there is a track record of power allowed that is forcing its way through our home run model and giving big totals to Mets hitters in this matchup. Teheran is going to turn back into a pumpkin and we want to be on the other side of the matchup when it happens, which could be as soon as tonight. Vegas has the Mets at a 4.95-run implied total, they know that Teheran has been getting lucky and allows far too much contact for a team like the Mets, even if they have underwhelmed this season overall. New York’s projected lineup opens with Brandon Nimmo, who has a 126 WRC+ with eight home runs and three stolen bases and makes sturdy contact with a 45.7% hard-hit rate. Nimmo strikes out a bit more so far this year, going up from 17.2% to 22.6% but he walks at a 10.7% clip and gets on base regularly. With Nimmo as a good correlated scoring option, there should be plenty of opportunities for Starling Marte to follow through on his turnaround and for today’s home run pick, Francisco Lindor, to deliver more than he has this season. Marte has 21 stolen bases and four home runs but is still 14% below the average for run creation. Lindor has been seven percent above average for run creation but the team needs more. His power is intact with 15 home runs and a .219 ISO on 11.7% barrels and a 45.9% hard-hit rate but his triple-slash has been lousy to this point. Lindor is a star who is underpriced for his talent at $4,800/$3,400, he has a 13.67 in our home run model and looks like a strong play in this spot. Pete Alonso leads the entire slate again today with a 23.66 in the home run model against Teheran. The slugging first baseman has 24 long balls on the season and comes cheap at just $5,400/$4,100. Daniel Vogelbach has good left-handed platoon-focused power over time but has not been overly productive this year with a 94 WRC+ and just four home runs. Tommy Pham has been more productive than Jeff McNeil, Pham has far more power and offers similar speed to the slap-hitter while McNeil has gotten unlucky at the plate and is suffering another down year on the back of a low BABIP. Francisco Alvarez and Brett Baty are two premium rookies late in the lineup, both are in play and showing strong marks for home run potential with Alvarez at 9.62 and Baty over the magic number at 10.04.
Play: Mets bats/stacks, David Peterson value shares in moderate doses
Update Notes:
Minnesota Twins (+137/4.11) @ Atlanta Braves (-149/4.99)
The game in Atlanta has a somewhat surprising run total, given the pitchers involved. There is a moderate wind blowing out to left field that should feed into power, but both Bryce Elder and Joe Ryan are talented starters who have been pitching well this season. Elder gets the start for the home team at just $9,200/$9,700, he has a sterling 2.40 ERA with a 3.66 xFIP that tells the full tale of his 15 starts and 90 innings. The righty has worked deep into ball games and has been good at keeping the ball in the yard by cutting launch angles. Elder has allowed just a 2.22% home run rate on a 6.1-degree average launch angle, a trait that looks consistent with his output over 54 innings and nine starts last season. Elder is not a big strikeout option, but his 20.8% rate is not terrible and it comes with a 10.8% swinging-strike rate that shows he can work his way out of a rare jam. For his price, Elder projects well against a Twins team that needs something more than the term free-swinging. If most high-strikeout teams are free, the Twins are downright running a charity for opposing pitchers with their 29% strikeout rate across the projected lineup. Elder has a bit of potential to pad his MLB DFS total at what will almost certainly be single-digit ownership. The Twins lineup is not a good option when their power lines are cut. Elder’s ability to keep home runs off the table – yes of course we acknowledge that he could give up three long balls to Joey Gallo on his own, but we need to deal in the probable not the possible – should limit the appeal of the Twins, they are more likely to put a bunch of zeroes in a stack than they are to provide tournament-winning scores up and down the lineup. Edouard Julien has a 34.6% strikeout rate and a .341 on-base percentage in an odd combination in the leadoff role. The rookie hit four home runs early on and has a 120 WRC+ over 127 plate appearances. Carlos Correa has struggled his way through the season but does have 11 home runs and a .194 ISO. He is one of the better hitters on the team overall and has a 24.2% strikeout rate that is hilariously one of the low numbers on this squad. Alex Kirilloff has four home runs and a 119 WRC+ over 164 plate appearances with a 26.2% strikeout rate, Byron Buxton may or may not be in the lineup tonight, he strikes out at a 31.1% clip this season but also has 13 home runs. Max Kepler is a good left-handed power bat who leads the team at a 21.9% strikeout rate this season. Kepler costs $2,700 in the outfield on either site, he is an important value bat in the Twins lineup when stacking this team in a bad spot. Royce Lewis, Joey Gallo, Christian Vazquez, and Michael A. Taylor round out the projected batting order. There is home run quality in each of those options, but the matchup is not a good one for hitting the ball over the fence, which severely limits Gallo in particular.
The hometown Braves destroy pitchers on a regular basis. Seven of the nine hitters in the projected Atlanta lineup have a dozen or more home runs, but the team is facing a high-quality right-handed starter in Joe Ryan tonight. In his second full season in the Show, Ryan has a 2.98 ERA and 3.69 xFIP with a 27.3% strikeout rate over 93.2 innings and 15 starts. The righty has a terrific 0.91 WHIP and has induced a 13.6% swinging-strike rate while limiting barrels to just 4.4% and home runs to 2.19%. Ryan is a flyball pitcher who has given up a 20.3-degree average launch angle and 40.2% hard-hits, which could combine with the wind and Atlanta’s premium power to get the ball over the wall, but he has been very good at avoiding exactly that issue while posting big strikeout totals and clean innings all season. Ryan costs $10,800/$10,300 which should wipe out most public ownership in what most will view as a bad spot, he has a bit of potential and projects in the upper-middle of the pitching board. Ryan is not a leading option, the Braves are too good for that and the nearly five-run implied total pushes him down to just playable levels, but there is a healthy ceiling for the starter. The loaded Braves will throw power at Ryan all night, Ronald Acuna Jr. leads off with 17 home runs and 35 stolen bases in the books already this season. Acuna costs $6,600/$4,600, he should be more expensive than Elly De La Cruz on FanDuel and is the most expensive hitter on the DraftKings slate. The Braves probably will not be crushingly popular tonight, the public has a bit of respect for Ryan’s talent, which gives a bit more appeal to these pricey options. Ozzie Albies has 18 home runs and is the best second baseman in fantasy baseball if we do not count Mookie Betts at the position. Albies costs $5,500/$3,600 and is a strong buy when drafting stacks of Braves hitters. Austin Riley, Matt Olson, and Sean Murphy are a trio of stars at first base, third base, and catcher. They have combined for 50 home runs already this season, with Olson carrying 25 of them. At $5,500/$3,500, Riley is a cheap third baseman having a down season, he will come rampaging back to life for power as June turns to July, don’t miss the boat. Olson has been a star all season and costs full freight on both sites even in the tough matchup. Murphy has been in and out of the lineup the past few days, if he plays he is a great option when stacking Braves, backup Travis d’Arnaud is a step back but not a large one, he also offers good right-handed power at the plate. Marcell Ozuna and Eddie Rosario are a pair of players many had unfairly written off coming into 2023, they have combined for 29 home runs and both sit at 119 WRC+ marks for the season. Orlando Arcia and Michael Harris II receive plenty of praise in this space for their talents, Arcia is a great option for positional flexibility who is never popular or expensive enough, Harris is well on his way back to a good stat line after a terrible start.
Play: Joe Ryan and Bryce Elder both as mid-board low-owned choices, Braves bats/stacks
Update Notes:
Houston Astros (-120/4.20) @ St. Louis Cardinals (+101/3.99)
The Astros are in St. Louis for a matchup between two underperforming former powerhouse franchises in what should be a decent pitching duel. The Astros are road favorites against quality lefty Jordan Montgomery despite just a 4.20-run implied total. Montgomery has been good this season but his appeal for DFS purposes is typically somewhat limited given a low strikeout rate. Over 85.1 innings and 15 starts, the southpaw has amassed a 21.8% strikeout rate with a 10% swinging-strike rate and 27.5% CSW% while pitching to a 3.69 ERA and 3.89 xFIP. Those are effective SP2 numbers for $7,200 on DraftKings where Montgomery is more in play than he seems at his $9,100 price tag on FanDuel. The Astros lineup has been baseball’s best at limiting strikeouts against lefties this year with a collective 15.4% strikeout rate across the active roster in the split. They have a 102 WRC+ and .150 ISO against lefties, so it is not all bad news for Montgomery, but the lack of strikeouts he typically posts combined with the infrequency with which these hitters sit themselves down against lefties is a big concern. This does not lead us all that frequently to Houston’s lineup, Montgomery is good enough that this seems like a game that will fall within the range of expectations in Vegas’ run lines. When rostering Astros hitters, Jose Altuve and Kyle Tucker should be fixtures from the first and third spots in the batting order, and Alex Bregman should not be far behind for total shares. Altuve has three home runs and five steals with a 118 WRC+ in 114 plate appearances, Bregman has a 111 WRC+ and 11 home runs in a bit of a down season, and Tucker has scuffled to 10 home runs and 14 stolen bases with a 119 WRC+ in 319 plate appearances in a season that is definitely a downturn but still good for mere mortals. Tucker is a better player than this and is priced like it, which makes him an awkward fit but one that will not be popular outside of Astros stacks. Jose Abreu has been very bad for most of the season but has clawed his way to five home runs and a 68 WRC+ over the last few weeks of life at the plate. Yainer Diaz has gone from backup catcher to near-everyday player with a .276/.289/.512 triple-slash, a.236 ISO, and seven home runs. Jeremy Pena has the same nine home runs and eight stolen bases that it seems like he started the season with, his WRC+ is down to 98 and he has not been the star shortstop the Astros might have thought they had on their hands. Chas McCormick is having a good season in his small sample of 158 plate appearances with seven home runs and seven stolen bases. The outfielder has a .207 ISO and has created runs 20% better than average at cheap prices and low DFS popularity. Jake Meyers and Martin Maldonado close out the lineup as mix-in options.
The Cardinals will be hard-pressed to create runs or hit for their typically decent home run potential against elite lefty Framber Valdez. St. Louis’s active roster has a collective 21.4% strikeout rate with a .163 ISO and 105 WRC+ against lefties this season, but Valdez typically has a deadening effect on opposing bats, and projects to do just that in our model or in Vegas where the Cardinals are limited to just a 3.99-run total. Valdez has a 26.7% strikeout rate over 99 innings in 15 starts, he has been baseball’s best option for reliable depth of innings, he has a 5.4% walk rate with a 2.27 ERA and 2.82 xFIP while cutting power out of opposing lineups. The southpaw has allowed a 1.54% home run rate on a 2.2-degree launch angle, he is notorious for limiting launch angle to negative degrees, so the ball has gotten into the air slightly more often this season, but the pitcher remains tremendous and looks like a good option at $10,100/$11,200, while the Cardinals are our 22nd-ranked team by collective fantasy point projections. Tommy Edman typically leads off against lefties, he has seven home runs and 14 stolen bases and will be running if he reaches first base. Paul Goldschmidt has 13 home runs, Nolan Arenado has 15, and Willson Contreras has eight. None of them crack even a 5.0 in our home run model against Valdez but they are priced for regular action. The veterans are high-impact players on most DFS slates, but this is a bad spot to roster Cardinals hitters. Jordan Walker has six home runs and three stolen bases with a 135 WRC+ over 153 rookie plate appearances while slashing .302/.366/.475 and fulfilling his prospect profile. Walker is cheap in a bad spot at $3,200/$3,000. Dylan Carlson, Lars Nootbaar, Paul DeJong, and Brendan Donovan are all players who typically land in our Cardinals stacks, but the lefties are particularly overmatched in this spot and the righties are mix-ins at best.
Play: Framber Valdez, Jordan Montgomery in smaller portions, only contrarian shares of either lineup
Update Notes:
Detroit Tigers (+169/4.07) @ Texas Rangers (-185/5.55)
Lefty Martin Perez checks in as a value option on both sites tonight, but he is better utilized as a cheap SP2 on DraftKings than on his own on the blue site. At $5,700/$8,000, Perez does not have to do all that much on the mound tonight, which is good because he has pitched to just a 15.3% strikeout rate this season. The veteran has a 4.38 ERA and 4.91 xFIP and has allowed a 3.54% home run rate in 84.1 innings and 15 outings, but he is facing the lowly Tigers who land at just a 4.07-run implied total in Vegas. Perez is drawing a good-enough projection in our pitching model for the SP2 pricing, his viability for a quality start bonus on FanDuel is a bit of a question, but he worked six innings and booked the bonus two starts ago and posted a seven-inning start his last time out. Across those 13 innings, Perez struck out only five hitters and allowed four home runs with two home runs, so “quality” is a relative term. The Tigers projected lineup can be played back the other way against this starter, they are not good but neither is Perez at this point. Matt Vierling has gotten most of his quality against righties this season, the right-handed outfielder is slashing .274/.338/.421 with a 114 WRC+ overall and should lead off for this team. Spencer Torkelson’s production against lefties was featured in this space yesterday, he is slightly more productive in the split and overall he hits the ball hard enough to justify better statistics than he has posted to this point, a notion supported by his .434 xSLG compared to just a .360 actual slugging percentage. Andy Ibanez had a good night at the plate last night and comes back against another lefty, he is productive in the split but is a fairly low-end player overall. Javier Baez has been bad against both hands and on the whole this season, he has five total home runs with a .108 ISO and 64 WRC+ in 308 plate appearances. Eric Haase has been lousy for most of the season and particularly bad against lefties this year, he hit 14 home runs in 351 plate appearances last year and does have a bit of right-handed thump in his bat, even if it has been missing for most of this season. The catcher has three homers in 206 tries this year. Jonathan Schoop and Miguel Cabrera are just rounding out their careers in Detroit, they have very little upside for DFS purposes. Zack Short has been productive against lefties this year and has a 99 WRC+ overall in 106 plate appearances, and Jake Marisnick is a mix-in if he hits ninth.
The Rangers are one of the day’s leading stacks at a 5.55-run implied total in a matchup against Matt Manning. The righty has a 4.63 ERA and 5.83 xFIP with a 14.6% strikeout rate in his two starts and 11.2 innings this year. While those numbers are unfair in the tiny sample, his 18.3% strikeout rate and 4.37 xFIP in 63 innings and 12 starts last year are a bit more filled out, as are his 14.8% strikeout rate and 5.13 xFIP in 85.1 innings the year before. Manning is not a premium pitcher and he is not in play at $6,000/$7,000 against one of the most productive lineups in baseball. Marcus Semien and Corey Seager are very much in play atop this deep productive lineup. Semien fills second base for $5,700/$3,700 and has seen his price come down slightly after a bit of a minor dip in production. He has 11 home runs and seven stolen bases on the season with a 122 WRC+, his slump was barely noticeable in his statistics. Seager slots in for $6,000/$4,500 at shortstop, he is a top option across the slate at his position with 10 home runs and a .265 ISO while creating runs 78% better than average this season. Seager has a 6.47 that is tied with Semien’s mark in our home run model tonight. Nathaniel Lowe is a cheap first baseman in the heart of this order whether he hits third against a righty or fifth against a lefty. Lowe has eight home runs and has created runs 25% better than average with a sturdy hit tool but lands significantly cheaper than his teammates. Adolis Garcia has 18 home runs and six steals while creating runs 24% better than average with a 15.4% barrel rate and 51.4% hard-hit rate for the season. The outfielder is a star and he is underpriced at $5,300 on DraftKings, his $3,900 FanDuel price is more appropriate. Josh Jung has raked at third base all season but costs $4,500/$3,300 despite 15 home runs, a .209 ISO, and a 121 WRC+. Catchers Jonah Heim and Mitch Garver are a good duo when they are both in the lineup and either is playable when only one of them starts. Both backstops have power at fair prices and moderate popularity in Rangers stacks. Ezequiel Duran and Leody Taveras have been productive run creators and have provided MLB DFS value as mix-in options in stacks with the players higher in the lineup.
Play: Rangers bats/stacks, Martin Perez SP2 value in small doses
Update Notes:
Philadelphia Phillies (-127/4.53) @ Chicago Cubs (+107/4.17)
Veteran righty Jameson Taillon looks like a target more than an option on the mound in Chicago tonight. The Phillies have a 4.53-run implied total with Taillon sitting at a 6.71 ERA and 5.19 xFIP for the season, they have roughly a half-run cut from their implied team total because the wind is blowing in at Wrigley Field tonight. The starter has not been good at much on the mound in 2023, he has a 4.18% home run rate and just an 18.8% strikeout rate. Taillon has not been a big strikeout pitcher in his career, but he was a playable DFS option when he sat at 23.2% two years ago, he is not much of one anymore despite a cheap $6,200/$6,000 price tag. Taillon has allowed an 11.6% barrel rate and a ton of contact this season, Kyle Schwarber is salivating in the leadoff spot for Philadelphia. The lefty slugger has a 14.31 in our home run model and is one of the more likely options for a long ball. Schwarber has hit 20 on the season and has a .249 ISO with a 15.2% barrel rate and 47.2% hard hits. Trea Turner has been coming on somewhat, for real this time. We think. The star shortstop has scuffled his way to .248/.305/.387 with eight home runs and 15 stolen bases and has been 14% below the line for run creation, he is a challenging buy at $5,600/$3,500 with that production, but his significant star-caliber track record is enough to bolster faith in the price. Nick Castellanos also helps, the outfielder is another player whose price does not budge despite his productivity. Castellanos has a .313/.359/.490 triple-slash with nine home runs that aligns well with seasons past, and he is at .375/.416/.588 with a .213 ISO and 169 WRC+ for the month of June, so recent performance is not the cause of his $4,300/$3,400 pricing. Take advantage of a good player at a huge discount in a good spot and lineup. Bryce Harper is affordable at $5,900/$3,600, he has a 116 WRC+ as he tries to find his full form at the plate. JT Realmuto is a very good option at catcher whenever he plays, he has eight home runs and 10 stolen bases this year and costs just $5,400/$3,100. Bryson Stott, Alec Bohm, Brandon Marsh, and Kody Clemens are a strong bottom four that would not be out of place higher up in the lineup. Stott has a 103 WRC+ in 319 plate appearances to lead the group in opportunities, he has been good with seven homers, 13 steals, and a lot of correlated scoring. Bohm has seven home runs but a 93 WRC+ in 268 chances, Marsh has five homers and four steals with a 115 WRC+ and an excellent 51.4% hard-hit rate, and Clemens leads the group with a 7.11 in our home run model at $2,200/$2,100 and what should be very low popularity.
The Cubs draw lefty Ranger Suarez who is typically good at limiting home runs and should be even more effective with the wind at his back. Suarez has a 23% strikeout rate with a 3.50 ERA and 3.47 xFIP in 43.2 innings and eight starts this year, he has been good on the mound. The lefty has limited launch angles to just 6.9 degrees with a 1.64% home run rate this year and has demonstrated that talent in seasons past. Last year he allowed a 5.1-degree launch angle and 2.27% home runs and the year before was a 4.4-degree launch angle and 0.96% home runs in a hybrid role between 12 starts and bullpen innings. Suarez is not an ace but he has SP2 value at $7,000 on the DraftKings slate and has a very good chance of limiting any output by the Cubs offense over six or seven innings. At $9,000 on the FanDuel slate, Suarez is a very different but still playable option, he projects in the lower part of the board but has a bit of additional upside for clean innings beyond what the model is showing. The Cubs lineup has several good impact hitters who have mid-range power, speed, and an ability to get on base and sequence for runs, but they are not great and they are capped for home run potential between the breeze and the talent on the mound. Nico Hoerner is a good leadoff option who has been exactly at league average with a 100 WRC+ in 310 plate appearances. He has 17 stolen bases but could stand to get on base at better than a .329 clip. Seiya Suzuki has six home runs and a 104 WRC+ and gets on at a .340 pace ahead of power-hitting Christopher Morel who has 13 home runs on the season. Morel has a 157 WRC+ and .346 ISO in his 142 plate appearances with a 16.7% barrel rate and 47.8% hard-hit rate to this point. Dansby Swanson and Ian Happ are good options for value at $4,600/$3,000 and $4,200/$3,200 at shortstop and in the outfield. The veterans are typically underappreciated assets for on-base skills and a bit of power, but they have not been great in the home run department with just 15 combined dingers this year. Trey Mancini, Yan Gomes, Miguel Amaya, and Nick Madrigal are mix-and match options late in the lineup in a fairly low-end spot for power.
Play: Ranger Suarez value, Phillies bats/stacks as a mid-level option
Update Notes:
Cleveland Guardians (-145/4.96) @ Kansas City Royals (+133/4.15)
The Guardians have been a bad team this year but they are facing Brady Singer, who has been even worse. The righty has talent, he was good over the past two seasons and was someone we expected to take steps forward this year, instead, he has gone backward by quite a bit on the mound. Singer’s strikeout rate has fallen from 24.2% to 19.3% in his 76.2 innings and 15 starts this year and he has pitched to a 6.34 ERA with a 4.49 xFIP. The righty has allowed a 10.1% barrel rate and a massive 54.7% hard-hit rate with 92.6 mph of exit velocity and a 2.88% home run rate that should probably be a lot higher. Singer has been a target for most of the season, even the lousy Guardians are drawing a 4.96-run implied total against him in this spot. Cleveland’s lineup looks somewhat playable, but if they are popular we are happy to leave the group of underperformers to the public with 29 other options on the board. Steven Kwan was good with a 124 WRC+ and .373 on-base percentage last year, this year’s 92 WRC+ and .335 on-base percentage have not been good at all, he has only correlation value at $4,100/$3,100. Amed Rosario hit 11 home runs and stole 18 bases with a 103 WRC+ last year, he has one home run and eight stolen bases with a 79 WRC+ this year while slashing .255/.304/.340 with a 2.2% barrel rate. There might be a better two-hitter working at a snack stand in Kansas City tonight. Jose Ramirez has been the team’s best player with a .221 ISO and 131 WRC+ over 327 plate appearances but even his performance has been somewhat underwhelming this season. Ramirez has 12 home runs and six stolen bases with a 7.9% barrel rate and 38.7% hard hits. Josh Naylor and Josh Bell land in the heart of the lineup, they have combined for 17 home runs and Naylor has 10 of those. Bell has not been good this season, Naylor is the much better option at first base in this lineup but both are playable if one is building numerous stacks of Guardians. Andres Gimenez was expected to provide double-digit home run and stolen base totals, he has five homers and eight steals in 286 plate appearances with a 92 WRC+ as a cheap second baseman. Will Brennan, Myles Straw, and Bo Naylor round out the projected lineup, Naylor has power potential as a rookie catcher, the other two are not strong DFS options.
The Royals have home run power at the very top of their lineup with a very weak bottom end and a ton of strikeouts throughout, this combination of factors should play in favor of rookie hurler Gavin Williams, who is making the second start of his promising career tonight. Williams was not outstanding in his debut, but if one looks at specifics we can see that he made one bad mistake by hanging an 0-2 curveball that was tattooed for a three-run game-changer of a home run. The right-handed flamethrower struck out four but walked three in 5.2 innings while allowing the home run and one additional run on four total hits. Williams is one of the top pitching prospects in the entire sport, he has a plus-plus fastball and excellent grades in Stuff+ marks, he is a bargain option at $5,900/$8,200 and should be played aggressively on both sites. Williams’ price on DraftKings is just a mistake, even with no history to bank on his pedigree should stand up for at least a $7,000 marker on the two-pitcher site. Williams had a 33.3% strikeout rate at AAA this season prior to his callup, there is a big ceiling on this starter in both the short and long term. Nick Pratto has been all over the map for quality this season. The former first-round pick started out hot and has five home runs in 212 plate appearances but has seemingly not done much in the power department for a few weeks and has struck out at an unsustainable 35.8% rate. Bobby Witt Jr. is up to a 92 WRC+ with 12 home runs and 23 stolen bases but needs to do more and would benefit significantly from focusing on drawing a few more walks and boosting his on-base percentage from .290. Sal Perez has 15 home runs and a .212 ISO, he has thunder behind the plate as one of the better power-hitting catchers in baseball. MJ Melendez has the theory of left-handed power, if not the reality. Despite a 51.7% hard-hit rate and 11.5% barrels, Melendez has hit only six home runs with a .130 ISO. Maikel Garcia, Nicky Lopez, Samad Taylor, Drew Waters, and Dairon Blanco are a very weak bottom end that should remind Williams of all of his success in AAA.
Play: Gavin Williams value aggressively, Guardians bats/stacks as a mid-range option but not so much if they are popular on a big slate
Update Notes:
Los Angeles Dodgers (-273/7.62) @ Colorado Rockies (+243/4.56)
The Dodgers are projected for more than a touchdown on the board in Vegas tonight in their game against Connor Seabold at Coors Field. If you plan to roster Seabold in this spot you are a braver soul than we are, probably a worse DFS player, but much braver for sure. Seabold wears a “hit me hard” sign on the mound, he has a 4.26% home run rate with a 5.88 ERA and 5.43 xFIP and strikes out just 16.7%. The Dodgers are going to be monumentally popular for a 15-game slate, but it is entirely warranted. Mookie Betts has a 19.16 in our home run model, he has 19 on the season with a .254 ISO while creating runs 36% better than average in one of baseball’s best lineups. Betts costs $6,400/$4,500 and has multi-position eligibility on both sites. Freddie Freeman is one of baseball’s best players, he does everything well at the plate and is slashing .317/.397/.549 with a .232 ISO while creating runs 54% better than average. Freeman has a 12.8% barrel rate and 43.2% hard-hit rate with 14 home runs and has added 10 stolen bases with sneaky speed. Five-tool Freddie Freeman costs $6,200/$4,600 at first base in Coors Field and already has six total bases just on his way to the ballpark. Will Smith strikes out at a 13.8% clip and has 12 home runs with a .226 ISO and 41.2% hard-hit rate, it is unfair to let this team hit against this pitcher in this ballpark. Max Muncy is back in the Dodgers’ lineup, for real this time. Muncy has massive left-handed power and a 21.35 in our home run model, he has 18 on the season with a .282 ISO. JD Martinez has a 17.3% barrel rate and 51.9% hard-hit mark and leads the hard-hitting Dodgers lineup with a .301 ISO this year. Martinez will be very popular at $5,400/$3,800. David Peralta, Jason Heyward, Miguel Vargas, and James Outman are a productive bunch to hand-wave as mix-in options but the truth is that they will all be fairly popular in Dodgers stacks while helping to offset the high prices of their teammates with quality options. Each player is viable as a mix-in, Peralta is a veteran with a bit of power, Heyward offers the same and has been more productive in his small sample this year, and Vargas and Outman are you players who can drive the ball. Outman’s lefty power is enticing, he has nine home runs and an 11% barrel rate in his 256 opportunities.
Clayton Kershaw is a bit of a dilemma at Coors Field tonight. The veteran southpaw has more than enough to post a big score in the ballpark and he has been pitching well through most of the season. Kershaw has a 28.5% strikeout rate with a 2.72 ERA and 3.21 xFIP on the season and he is facing the league’s worst team against left-handed pitching. Colorado’s collective 71 WRC+ in the split is baseball’s worst mark against either hand, they are an inept bunch and Kershaw is one of the few pitchers we will trust in Coors Field. The size of the slate renders the lefty a bit less interesting, but should also serve to keep his popularity extremely low, Kershaw is not a crazy tournament option at $9,700/$10,600, his talent outpaces the risk of Coors Field and a lack of popularity serves to offset any price concerns. The Rockies are not a great option at the plate, they can be played in small doses given the ballpark, but a 4.56-run total at Coors should tell us all we need to know, which is that Kershaw is the better side of the equation. Viable Rockies hitters include neither Jurickson Profar nor Ezequiel Tovar outside of their top-two positioning in the batting order. They have WRC+ marks of 76 and 80 for the season with few counting stats to speak of. Ryan McMahon has good left-handed power and the team is getting CJ Cron back on the right side of the plate, but Kershaw is not going to be overly threatened by either. McMahon loses quality in same-handed matchups and Cron was awful through the first part of the season prior to his injury. The slugging first baseman does lead the Rockies with a 6.99 in our home run model, he has six on the season in 148 plate appearances. Elias Diaz has been a good hitter and has a 106 WRC+ in 267 plate appearances as a cheap catcher. Randal Grichuk hits for average but not power now, Elehuris Montero has not been good over 101 plate appearances but is a highly-rated rookie, Coco Montes has done less in his 35 plate appearances as a cheap infielder, and Brenton Doyle has provided infrequent counting stats but does have six home runs and 10 steals in 164 opportunities.
Play: Dodgers bats/stacks aggressively despite popularity, Clayton Kershaw, minor hedge Rockies if that’s your thing
Update Notes:
Chicago White Sox (+167/3.44) @ Los Angeles Angels (-183/4.66)
A matchup against ace Shohei Ohtani is wiping the White Sox off the white board for the day. Chicago’s underperforming lineup is carrying a 3.44-run implied total, they are not entirely unplayable and there is talent but the size of this slate and the dominance of the pitcher do not make them a very appealing contrarian play. Ohtani has a 32.6% strikeout rate with a 3.13 ERA and 3.47 xFIP while inducing a 13.3% swinging-strike rate and posting a 31% CSW% and allowing just 33.7% hard hits and an 85.6 mph exit velocity average as one of the best power-hitting outfielders in baseball. The two-way righty is priced fairly but highly at $11,300/$10,800, he has an excellent chance to post the top pitching score of the day at what should be high but moderate popularity for who he is on a big slate. Ohtani is a great buy in the matchup, a few shares of hedge White Sox would be our limit, with a focus on the heart of the projected batting order from 3-6. Andrew Benintendi and Tim Anderson have underwhelmed as contact-based hitters and run creators atop the lineup, both are below average but Benintendi’s 93 WRC+ is far better than Anderson’s 53. Luis Robert Jr. has been hitting home runs on a daily basis, he has 22 on the season as the team’s best player and he should be a fixture in all White Sox stacks today. Eloy Jimenez has power and major upside when he is healthy, but this is a brutal matchup and his 25.5% strikeout rate is not going to help him. Yasmani Grandal and Andrew Vaughn are playable parts if one is rostering White Sox in bunches in a bad decision. Grandal is cheap with limited power potential at catcher, Vaughn offers similar with a bit more pop and correlated scoring at first base. Gavin Sheets, Jake Burger, and Elvis Andrus round out the lineup, Sheets and Burger are low-end options to sell out for a home run, Andrus is bad.
The Angels have massive home run power up and down the lineup but the team is always flawed for DFS purposes when Ohtani is not available as a hitter. An eight-man lineup with a hole in the second spot is not a great option and does not provide ideal correlation even if the team hits. There is also the matter of a somewhat talented strikeout pitcher potentially poking holes in the lineup tonight. Michael Kopech has not been great this season, but his 4.06 ERA and 4.74 xFIP are not tragic and his 26.7% strikeout rate is quite good. Kopech has an 11.3% swinging-strike rate and has good stuff on the mound, but he has been lousy for power with a 4.55% home run rate and 14.4% barrel rate that should play to hitters like Mike Trout and Brandon Drury in the middle of the Angels batting order. At $8,800/$8,700 Kopech does not seem like a strong pitching option on this slate. The Angels lineup can be rostered in small doses but the Ohtani flaw is a problem. Mickey Moniak has been good in 101 plate appearances, he has seven home runs and a 186 WRC+ and still costs $4,200/$2,700 leading off. Trout slots in second with 17 home runs and a .228 ISO while creating runs 33% better than average. After Ohtani, who will of course be in the lineup in real life, Drury steps up with thunder on the right side. The infielder has 13 home runs and a .221 ISO this year, he has been a very good power hitter the past two seasons and comes cheap in this lineup in a good spot. Hunter Renfroe has 12 home runs this year and hit 60 the past two seasons combined, he is an excellent power threat for $4,700/$2,900 against Kopech and has a 9.58 in our home run model. Mike Moustakas has a minor amount of left-handed pop late in the lineup at what should be near-total lack of popularity. Taylor Ward has been up and down this season but has power potential at the plate, Matt Thaiss offers a bit of home run potential as a cheap catcher, and David Fletcher is not a DFS option at the bottom of the lineup.
Play: Shohei Ohtani, minor shares of Angels bats in a good spot but with no Ohtani in the DFS lineup
Update Notes:
Washington Nationals (+202/3.23) @ Seattle Mariners (-223/4.87)
A potentially underappreciated option on the mound on both sites is talented young right-hander Bryan Woo, who checks in at just $6,900/$8,900 against the lowly Nationals tonight. Woo has made four starts in the Show so far after coming up as yet another highly-regarded starter in the Mariners’ deep organization. Woo has dominated with a 33.8% strikeout rate and just a 6.8% walk rate while pitching to a 5.09 ERA but a 2.99 xFIP in 17.2 innings in the four starts. The righty has induced a 14.7% swinging-strike rate from Major League hitters this season with a 30.8% CSW% but a 4.05% home run rate. Woo struck out five Yankees in his last start while allowing just two hits in 5.1 innings, he had a 5.2-inning start and struck out nine in the outing prior to that. His lone bad start, and anything that looks unsightly in his line came in his first outing, a somewhat unfair debut at Texas in which he lasted just two innings and allowed six runs while striking out four. Woo is far better than that and should be a good play against a bad but low-strikeout lineup for Washington. Nationals bats are not a great option, they are more likely to limit Woo than truly damage him with high DFS scores, but Lane Thomas has been very good this season at .297/.345/.515 with a 130 WRC+ and 14 home runs. Luis Garcia is a playable infielder who lands at cheap prices atop the lineup, Jeimer Candelario has gotten most of his quality against righties this season and has 10 home runs and a .206 ISO overall on the year, and Joey Meneses is slashing .292/.331/.383 with an 18.9% strikeout rate. Corey Dickerson has a quality left-handed veteran bat and has hit two home runs in 92 plate appearances but has just an 86 WRC+ in the small sample. Keibert Ruiz is a good young catcher with power, he has eight home runs this season but has not fully found himself at the MLB level yet. Dominic Smith, Derek Hill, and CJ Abrams round out the lineup in low-end form.
The Mariners’ hard-hitting lineup looks like a good option against Jake Irvin tonight. The Washington starter is not one who is likely to exploit the Mariners’ free-swinging nature, their collective 26.1% strikeout rate seems to matter less when cast against his 17.4% strikeout rate and 5.6% swinging-strike rate. The low-end righty has allowed a 4.71 ERA and 5.66 xFIP and has walked a whopping 12.1% of opposing hitters this season. Irvin does not look playable even at $5,100/$6,600. JP Crawford has six home runs and a productive 114 WRC+ with a .356 on-base percentage in the leadoff spot. Crawford provides good correlated scoring with Julio Rodriguez who has 13 homers and 18 stolen bases in 340 plate appearances. Rodriguez has not been as good as last season in his triple-slash or strikeout numbers, but his counting stats are roughly in-line with last year’s output and he has a long way to go before the year is done. At $5,100/$3,700, the Seattle star is cheap in the outfield for the matchup he has in front of him tonight, Rodriguez has a strong ceiling and a 9.98 in our home run model. Ty France has moderate power and a good hit tool and comes cheap at $3,400/$2,900 at first base. France has a 118 WRC+ to lead the team this year. Teoscar Hernandez, Cal Raleigh, Eugenio Suarez, and Jarred Kelenic all have massive power but they all strike out between 25 and 33% of the time. That should not be a major issue against Irvin, who will allow enough premium contact that one or more of these hitters should find a good MLB DFS score in this matchup. Everyone in the group is at a cheap price and will probably be less popular than the matchup suggests on a huge slate. There is opportunity throughout the Mariners lineup, even eight-hitter Mike Ford is pulling a good home run mark from the left side and Jose Caballero is an effective wraparound option with on-base skills.
Play: Bryan Woo aggressively, Mariners bats/stacks
Update Notes:
New York Yankees (-132/4.31) @ Oakland Athletics (+121/3.79)
The Yankees flawed Judgeless lineup is drawing a 4.31-run implied total against Paul Blackburn in Oakland tonight despite ranking last in the league in runs scored for the month of June. New York has been awful without their captain and star, but there is both talent and value in the Yankees lineup for DFS purposes and they are showing fair projections with decent home run marks in our model tonight. Blackburn is not a bad starter, he has a 25.6% strikeout rate with a 4.21 ERA and 3.78 xFIP in five starts this year and was similarly effective with a more realistic 19.1% strikeout rate over 111.1 innings in 21 starts last season. The righty has been good at limiting power this year and has the potential to post a good-enough score at $7,700/$7,800, but there are better options in every aspect of the pitching board from price to popularity to projection tonight. Gleyber Torres has 12 home runs but has slipped to .246/.322/.419 with a 107 WRC+ for the season, he is an affordable option in the leadoff spot at $5,200/$2,800, he and most of the team are slightly better values on FanDuel. Harrison Bader has a good bat with speed and a bit of power, he has six home runs and seven stolen bases with a 103 WRC+ and .218 ISO in 115 plate appearances and costs just $3,600/$3,100 in the outfield. Anthony Rizzo and Giancarlo Stanton lead the team with a 10.93 and a 13.76 in our home run model, both sluggers are priced below $3,000 on FanDuel, which should truly never be the case, they cost $3,700 and $4,600 on DraftKings. Jake Bauers has a bit of thump from the left side but he has never been a Major League regular for good reason, he is a limited hitter overall and is striking out at a 28.1% clip. Josh Donaldson is a home run or a zero, he has six homers and a lot more zeroes in his 71 opportunities this season. Billy McKinney has had a good 55 plate appearances so far, he is slashing .302/.327/.623 with four home runs in the tiny sample and hits left-handed. Anthony Volpe has 10 home runs and 15 stolen bases but does not hit consistently or get on base with regularity. Kyle Higashioka makes infrequent but outstanding contact at the plate, he has three home runs in 125 plate appearances but a 54.3% hard-hit rate and a 13.6% barrel rate for $2,400/$2,200 and no popularity.
The Athletics lousy lineup is facing Jhony Brito who was effective but not good in his return to the Majors in his last start. Brito struck out three and walked one but allowed only two hits in 5.2 innings while shutting down the Mariners’ lineup. Even against the Athletics, it is difficult to envision Brito putting up even that type of start tonight, he is just not a true Major League talent. Clean innings are possible but unlikely, a high strikeout total is even less likely for the righty who has amassed just a 16.7% strikeout rate with an 8.3% swinging-strike rate in 10 starts and 46 innings. Brito costs $6,400/$7,600 against a lineup we typically like to target but he does not project as a strong option and we prefer the Athletics if we had to take a side. Fortunately, both options can be left on the table in DFS. In the matchup sense, Oakland’s capable lefties would be in play. That list includes Ryan Noda in the second spot in the lineup and Seth Brown in the fourth, if not leadoff man Tony Kemp and three-hitter JJ Bleday. The former two have been productive this season, Noda has power and gets on base while creating runs at a strong pace, Brown has missed time but has both power and speed. Kemp has a 65 WRC+ in 209 plate appearances and has gotten on base at a .286 clip, he is an odd choice for the leadoff spot. Bleday has hit five home runs but is slashing .205/.314/.385 over 137 plate appearances. Aledmys Diaz is a clickable option with multi-position eligibility in the middle of the lineup for cheap prices, he hit 12 home runs in 327 plate appearances his last season in Houston in 2022. Jace Peterson, Shea Langeliers, Tyler Wade, and Esteury Ruiz are mix-in values late in the lineup. Peterson and Langeliers have moderate power upside, Langeliers is at least a sneaky catcher play from time to time, while Wade is a good positional flex play and Ruiz loses much of the value of his speed in this spot in the lineup.
Play: Yankees bats/stacks
Update Notes:
Tampa Bay Rays (+115/4.09) @ Arizona Diamondbacks (-124/4.50)
With nearly a half-hour before the 4:15 start time of today’s show, we arrive at the final game of the slate. Hopefully, there are 15 games in this article anyway, at this point, all we can see is a bright blurry spot. The Rays and Diamondbacks square off in a matchup of two good teams that were not expected to be this good this season. The Diamondbacks will have Zac Gallen on the hill for his 17th start of the season. The talented righty has been very good this year, he has a 2.84 ERA and 3.41 xFIP with a 26.4% strikeout rate and has induced a 12.6% swinging-strike rate with a 29.1% CSW%. Gallen has allowed just a 1.52% home run rate despite 44.2% hard hits and a 91.2 mph average exit velocity. The righty is pulling down a strong projection for $9,900/$10,000, and he is unlikely to be very popular in a matchup against one of baseball’s most productive lineups after a run of a few starts in which he has been good but not dominant. Gallen is a playable option for his ceiling at price and popularity but the spot is in no way safe, hedge stacks of Rays are a good option if getting carried away with Gallen shares. Tampa Bay’s projected batting order kicks off with Yandy Diaz who has seen his power dip somewhat in June but has maintained steady value with a 164 WRC+ and a .404 on-base percentage. Diaz is slashing .316/.404/.518 and strikes out at just a 15.4% clip to start the lineup for just $5,300/$3,800 with eligibility at first base on DraftKings and adding third base on the blue site. Wander Franco and Randy Arozarena are stars with totals of nine home runs and 25 stolen bases for Franco and 14 home runs with nine steals for Arozarena, in between we should find left-handed thumper Luke Raley. The hard-hitting cheap option has eligibility at first base and in the outfield on both sites and he has hit 12 home runs in only 198 plate appearances this year. Raley has a .297 ISO with a 19.3% barrel rate and 49.1% hard-hits so far this season but the matchup against Gallen is a challenging one that has the Rays at just a 4.09-run implied total and Raley at an 8.44 in our home run model. Josh Lowe has 11 homers and 18 stolen bases, Taylor Walls has seven home runs and 16 steals but has come back to Earth in everything else, and Jose Siri has been dynamite with 14 home runs and seven stolen bases in 177 chances. Francisco Mejia and Vidal Brujan close out the lineup.
The Diamondbacks will be facing elite rookie hurler Taj Bradley who has a dominant 34.5% strikeout rate with a 3.86 ERA and 2.74 xFIP in 49 innings and 10 starts. Bradley has been very good but is somewhat unreliable when it comes to depth, the only flaw in rostering him for DFS purposes when it comes to things in his control. Bradley is facing a Diamondbacks team that is good at limiting strikeouts and he costs $9,400/$9,900, he has a path to a high score but it is a bit obscured by potentially short innings and a good opponent who has the talent to take away what he does well on the mound. Ultimately, Bradley is entirely playable at these prices and he is not likely to be popular, but the Diamondbacks lineup seems like the slightly better play if one had to choose sides. Geraldo Perdomo has found a good home atop the lineup, he has a .398 on-base percentage for the year and can utilize his speed and provide good correlated scoring while driving the offense in this spot. Perdomo is cheap and should be included in stacks when looking to Arizona’s offense today. Ketel Marte has 14 home runs and a .223 ISO and has seemingly hit a home run every day for the last week. The second baseman has a $5,300/$3,500 price tag, he is too cheap for his potential at the plate even against a good starter. Corbin Carroll has 16 home runs and 23 steals in 313 star-making plate appearances, the outfielder is a strong buy in Diamondbacks stacks tonight. Christian Walker costs $5,000/$3,300 at first base, he has 15 home runs this season and has hit for average while avoiding strikeouts and is coming off of a 36 home run campaign that one would expect to make him pricier all year. Lourdes Gurriel Jr. and Emmanuel Rivera are good options in the heart of the lineup, Gurriel has a good hit tool and quality power with 11 home runs on the season and Rivera has been good over 148 plate appearances with a .314/.338/.407 triple-slash. Alek Thomas, Gabriel Moreno, and Jake McCarthy round out the projected Arizona lineup, they are mix-in parts in most stacks. Thomas and McCarthy have power and speed and Moreno is a good hitter for a young catcher who does not cost much or draw much popularity.
Play: Zac Gallen, Taj Bradley in smaller shares, Diamondbacks bats/stacks in small doses, Rays bats/stacks in small doses
Update Notes:
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