MLB PrizePicks Predictions Today: Top Plays for Wednesday, April 17
Traditional MLB DFS formats aren’t the only way to profit from daily fantasy baseball. MLB PrizePicks is a great fantasy pick’em site where we can take today’s projections versus theirs and combine two or more baseball predictions for sizeable payouts.
In this space, we’ll explore a few PrizePicks plays for the upcoming MLB slate. This article isn’t the be-all, end-all of great plays or a recommendation for a full ticket; it’s simply a starting place for you to explore thinking about the game within the game. Maybe you want to scatter these plays across entries. Maybe there are only two or three you think are worth playing. Daily fantasy pick’em gives us the flexibility to make only the plays in which we think there is value rather than being forced to create a full lineup while competing against the best DFS players in the industry.
PrizePicks is daily fantasy baseball made simple.
All stats cited are since the start of the 2023 season unless otherwise noted.
If you haven’t signed up for a PrizePicks account, make sure to use the PrizePicks promo code ROTOBONUS and get a $100 deposit match.
MLB PrizePicks Predictions for Wednesday, April 17
- Christopher Morel MORE Than 6.5 Fantasy Points
- Paul Goldschmidt MORE Than 6.5 Fantasy Points
- Shohei Ohtani MORE Than 8.5 Fantasy Points
- Max Fried LESS Than 5.0 Strikeouts
- Cristopher Sanchez MORE Than 6.0 Strikeouts
Christopher Morel MORE Than 6.5 Fantasy Points
Christopher Morel gets no respect from PrizePicks. Here he is with a 12.3% barrel rate against RHP, facing a guy in Brandon Pfaadt who has allowed an 11.7% barrel rate to righties to go with a 33.3% fly-ball rate. The roof will be closed, but still, 6.5 fantasy points against a pitcher vulnerable to power is just too low. We have Morel projected for 9.3 fantasy points — 43.1% higher than PrizePicks, which is the largest disparity on the day.
Paul Goldschmidt MORE Than 6.5 Fantasy Points
Paul Goldschmidt only has a .198 wOBA, .060 ISO, and 3.3% barrel rate against RHP this season, but I don’t care. He’s striking out a ton, but Paul Blackburn isn’t striking out anyone. If we’re gonna live on small samples, Blackburn only has an 11.5% K rate against righties this season — 20.9%, dating back to the start of the 2023 season. Is this a get-right spot for Goldschmidt? Who knows? But our 9-point projection shatters the PrizePicks projection by 38.5%.
Shohei Ohtani MORE Than 8.5 Fantasy Points
We don’t need to get in the weeds here. Shohei Ohtani has a barrel rate near 22% against RHP, while Jake Irvin can’t strike out lefties (17.6%) and has allowed a 10.2% barrel rate to them. We have Ohtani projected for a whopping 11.7 fantasy points — 37.6% above his PrizePicks projection. We just play him in our contests.
Max Fried LESS Than 5.0 Strikeouts
Somewhere in the next year or so, Max Fried is gonna light the league on fire for a high K rate, as he gets a lot of gas behind his fastball. But his 9.1 K/9 is still a bit ho-hum, and he has to face an Astros team that just doesn’t strike out (16.4% against LHP). For years, pitchers get crushed trying to strike out the Astros, and Fried is too smart for this. We have him projected for 4.3 strikeouts, so we wish PrizePicks had him at 5.5, but 5.0 is still a strong number to attack. To get 5 strikeouts against the Astros, getting into the 7th inning is usually pretty imperative. That isn’t unrealistic, but projected at only 91 pitches, we shouldn’t like Fried to get there.
Cristopher Sanchez MORE Than 6.0 Strikeouts
6.0 is a bit of a sticker shock for Cristopher Sanchez, but he faces the Rockies, whose projected lineup has a ridiculous 29.4% K rate against LHP. Sanchez isn’t a great strikeout pitcher, but he can get a batter per inning, in general. With a great shot to go 6 innings, he’s in a great spot to pick up an extra strikeout or two along the way, as we have him projected for 7.5 punch-outs on the day.
All projections referenced are accurate at the time of writing but subject to change.
We don’t love a lot of the pitcher projections, but there are a lot of total bases and hitter fantasy points projections to attack today. Make sure you’re using the RotoGrinders PrizePicks browser extension to be on top of how our projections line up with theirs.
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