CheeseIsGood's Million Dollar Musings - Friday, April 8th
Now this one feels like Opening Day! Thursday was a bit of a lackluster slate to kick things off, but there is a bit of everything going today. We’ve got a five-game early slate as well as a five-game evening slate on both FD and DK, and in an interesting turn of events, the game that would have completely thrown this into a chalk-fest has been left off of both the slates. The Dodgers are opening their season in Coors Field, but with the 4:10pm ET start, neither that game nor the Robbie Ray start in Minnesota are on these main slates. This is all very interesting, and I think I like it. If you could just stack the Dodgers, then we wouldn’t really have anything to talk about today. I would have just been able to tell you more about the big investment I made this off-season in a vampire hunting business. (I am now the main stake-holder.)
Friday Early Pitching
The Four Horseman Of The Opening Friday
Gerrit Cole vs Red Sox
Aaron Nola vs A’s
Brandon Woodruff at Cubs
Lucas Giolito at Tigers
Let’s start by pointing out that the weather looks shaky at best in Chicago and less than ideal in Detroit. Don’t get too attached to Woodruff or Giolito early on today.
Just as we saw yesterday, we need to assume that none of these pitchers are going to be at a full workload in their first start. But these are all elite level pitchers that can give you everything you need in 80-ish pitches. The best pitcher of the group, Gerrit Cole, also has the toughest matchup. I would absolutely get some pieces of all these guys if multi-entering, but in primary lineups, I’m going to be playing the matchup/salary game a little more. That leads me to Aaron Nola as my SP1 today. This Oakland lineup is one of the weakest in the league and will be a team to target pitchers against all season. Nola is elite with a 29.8% K rate and 5.2% walks last season, and he also threw five innings in his last spring start, so while pitch count is still an issue, he should be fine.