10 Definitely Interesting, Possibly Helpful MLB Notes for Tuesday, July 2nd
Welcome to 10 Definitely Interesting, Possibly Helpful Notes! In this column, I’ll work to uncover some interesting bits of information that might shed some light on players from that day’s slate of MLB games. This is not a picks column, nor is it a “fun facts” article – it’s something in between.
I hope you enjoy it, and I hope it helps you think about today’s MLB plays in a new way as you build your DFS lineups. Here are 10 Notes for Tuesday, July 2nd.
1. Charlie Morton has reached six or more strikeouts in eight consecutive games; previously in his career, his longest streak of games with 6+ strikeouts was five games, way back in 2014. Morton is in peak form at the ripe age of 35, and he’s got a peak matchup on Tuesday at home against the Baltimore Orioles. The Orioles have the lowest implied total on the slate at 2.50 runs, and it’s not close, with the next-lowest team at 3.53 (the D-backs against the Ross Stripling-led Dodgers). Tuesday’s slate is absolutely brimming with great pitching options in great matchups at the high end (Morton, Bauer vs. KC, Boyd vs. CWS, Corbin vs. MIA) and the low end (Lopez vs. DET, Strahm vs. SF), which means that Morton could get lost in the shuffle. But he’s as good a bet as anyone to pitch six or seven scoreless frames while racking up a bunch of Ks in the process. With 13 teams having implied totals of 5.00 runs or higher, paying up for bats over high-end pitching should take precedent in cash games, but Morton has big upside for GPPs.
2. James Paxton has a .385 BABIP or higher in each of the past four games despite a 29 percent hard-hit rate or below in three of those games. He’s been extremely unlucky. To be clear, Paxton is not the same pitcher as last year: he’s in the zone a lot less (6.9% decrease from 2018), which is leading to more walks (3.5% increase on walk rate since 2018). Worst of all, he’s allowing 6.3 percent more line drives than he did last season. Paxton’s first half-season in Yankee pinstripes has been rocky, at best. But in DFS, we care primarily about strikeouts, and Paxton can still miss bats with the best of them. Since 2018, he’s one of just seven pitchers (min. 200 IP) with 31 percent strikeouts and 13 percent swinging strikes, joining Sale, Cole, Scherzer, Snell, Verlander, and deGrom. His tag is reduced at DraftKings ($8,900) and Yahoo ($38) in particular. If you want high-end upside at a mid-tier price (with some risk, of course), Paxton is the guy.
3. Jack Flaherty is one of nine pitchers in MLB (min. 230 IP) with a 28 percent strikeout rate and 13 percent swinging strikes since 2018, and the others essentially makes up a who’s who of the best strikeout artists in MLB: Cole, Sale, Scherzer, Verlander, Snell, deGrom, Corbin, and Carrasco. In other words, Flaherty still has some of the better strikeout stuff in the game, even if he has regressed since his outstanding rookie campaign a year ago. Ironically, Flaherty’s struggles have come despite his improving his walk rate, which was arguably his biggest flaw in 2018. Like Paxton, he comes with some risk, but his topsy-turvy performance in 2018 has led to an appealing price tag at (also like Paxton) DraftKings and Yahoo, where he’s priced at $7,600 and $39, respectively. In a plus matchup against a Mariners lineup that is a lot less threatening with Encarnacion in the Bronx and Healy and Haniger on the IL, Flaherty is another upside arm in the mid-tier worth considering.
4. Matt Strahm is allowing home runs at a ridiculous rate. In fact, he’s allowed 2 homers in each of his past six starts; that’s tied for the longest streak in MLB history. Check it out, per Baseball Reference’s Play Index:
That’s…not a good thing. However, when you take out the homers, there’s plenty to like about Strahm on Tuesday. He’s got an elite changeup he uses to keep righties off balance (RHBs have managed just a .301 wOBA against him), he rarely issues free passes (his 5.1% walk rate would rank 12th in MLB if he had the innings to qualify), and most importantly, he’s facing a team that, as a rule, doesn’t hit home runs. Against left-handed pitching, the Giants have managed just 18 home runs, third-fewest in MLB, and their .122 ISO is second-lowest, just barely edging out the Marlins. In this matchup, Strahm should be able to keep the ball inside spacious PetCo Park, making him one of the better point-per-dollar plays on a loaded slate for pitching.
5. Reynaldo Lopez’s K rate in two games against the Tigers this season: 46.8%
Reynaldo Lopez’s K rate against the rest of MLB this season: 16.6%
Lopez struck out 14 and 8 batters in those starts against the Tigers, and while the easy thing to do is brush aside the Tigers matchups as a two-game sample (which it is) or a fluke (which it probably is), his normally moderate K upside absolutely gets a bump in this matchup. Detroit’s 26.3 percent strikeout rate against righties is highest in MLB, and they’ve allowed some mediocre-to-bad pitchers to post uncharacteristically high strikeout games: Anibal Sanchez, Jesse Chavez, Trevor Williams, Aaron Civale, Adam Plutko, Homer Bailey (among other obvious names like Trevor Bauer and Max Scherzer) have all fanned a half-dozen or more against the Tigers since mid-June. When you roster a low-strikeout pitcher like Lopez, you have to know that a game of, say, four strikeouts or fewer is well within the range of outcomes; in fact, Lopez has struck out 4 or fewer in 9 of his 17 starts this year. It’s a context-dependent play, and on Tuesday, the context is this: a ton of runs are going to be scored around MLB, and you’ll want exposure to big bats over high-priced pitching. A cheap pitcher in an ideal matchup like Lopez provides a pathway to expensive bats.
6. Charlie Blackmon is riding a 26-game hit streak at Coors Field in which he’s slashing (get ready) .475/.519/1.042, for a 1.562 OPS. He’s only fanned 7.8 percent of the time over this streak. Blackmon is only four games off the longest hit streak ever at Coors Field, set by Larry Walker in 2002. Even with Christian Yelich hitting home runs seemingly every day, and even with Mike Trout getting the platoon advantage in the Texas heat, Blackmon is the top overall play of the day. He’s in a matchup with something called Jose Urquidy (I’m joking, of course, but Urquidy has posted a 37 percent strikeout rate at Triple-A this year). Blackmon should have no trouble continuing the hit streak, and with the glut of affordable pitching on Tuesday, it shouldn’t be too difficult to fit him in even with his elevated price tag.
7. Only one player in MLB has more walks than strikeouts and 20 home runs in each of the last two seasons, and it’s not Mike Trout, or Christian Yelich; it’s Alex Bregman. In fact, if we want to go a little deeper, Bregman is the first player since Albert Pujols in 2002 to post multiple seasons of more walks than strikeouts and 20 homers before turning 26. After German Marquez dominant 2018 campaign, there was talk entering the season about whether he could “beat Coors”; well, he hasn’t, as is shown by his .352 wOBA (fifth-highest among qualifiers). For comparison, he’s allowing a .251 wOBA away from Coors. Coors always wins, which is why Bregman and the other Astros bats are just as much of a priority as the Rockies. (And it’s worth noting that if you play at Yahoo, Jose Altuve is egregiously priced at just $14. Lock him in and don’t look back).
8. Here are the players with 12 home runs, 8 steals, and a 132 or better wRC+ this year: Mike Trout, Christian Yelich, Cody Bellinger, Rafael Devers (pretty surprising in its own right, but not the punch line), and … Austin Meadows. Meadows and the Rays face Orioles right-hander Asher Wojciechowski, making his first start since 2017. Even if the Rays don’t get to Woj (no way I’m spelling that name again), the Orioles bullpen is currently allowing 2.0 home runs per nine innings…the highest mark ever for a bullpen. As a leadoff hitter on a team with a 6.0 implied run total, Meadows is a great tournament play across the industry, but at Yahoo, where he’s priced at a crazy low $11, he’s a great cash game play.
9. If you dig into Paul Goldschmidt’s batted ball data, his 2019 numbers against offspeed pitches stick out like a sore thumb: in 57 PAs ending with changeups this year, Goldy is slashing .115/.193/.173. That’s five singles and one homer, and nothing else. Has Goldschmidt suddenly forgotten how to hit offspeed pitches, or is there more to it? Let’s look at his BABIP against the pitch by year:
2012 – .375
2013 – .333
2014 – .350
2015 – .600
2016 – .321
2017 – .457
2018 – .378
2019 – .147
Goldschmidt isn’t broken; he’s just had incredibly bad luck on changeups this year, and it’s playing a large part in sinking his overall numbers. With that in mind, it’s concerning that he’s in a matchup with Wade LeBlanc, who throws his changeup a ton (28.4 percent, ninth-most of pitchers with 750 pitches thrown). Either way, I’ll choose to believe in Goldschmidt’s career-long track record of smashing lefties over a half-season of struggling; before 2019, Goldschmidt had posted a wRC+ of 147 or better against left-handed pitching in every season dating back to 2012. More than anything, though, it’s just bizarre to see Goldschmidt’s name next to $3,100 at FanDuel, or $3,600 at DraftKings, or $9 at Yahoo. He’s going to turn it around; play Goldschmidt while he’s underpriced.
10. If you’re looking for an off-the-board home run spec, how about Pete Alonso? Alonso faces a good pitcher in James Paxton, but he also happens to be a pitcher who throws four-seam fastballs all the time. Alonso has a .518 isolated power against four-seamers this year, second-highest among the 274 players with 50 batted balls against that pitch type. The only player who has crushed four-seamers more than Alonso this year? Joey Gallo. There’s absolutely no reason to play Alonso in anything but the deepest of tournament lineups, but given that Paxton should be somewhat popular, Alonso will see virtually no ownership, and he’s got a better shot than one might expect of hitting a dinger.
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Thanks for reading! Stats from this article were pulled from RotoGrinders’ PlateIQ tool, FanGraphs, Baseball Prospectus, Baseball Savant, Brooks Baseball, and Baseball Reference.
Check back for more “10 Notes” MLB articles every Tuesday and Friday throughout the year, and feel free to leave a question or comment down below!