CheeseIsGood's Million Dollar Musings - MLB DFS Strategy: Thursday, May 5th
Happy Thursday! After a very busy day of games yesterday, we get a bit of a breather tonight with a 6-game main slate that starts a few minutes earlier than usual at 6:45pm ET. We are back to a more pitcher-heavy slate, with no games opening above an 8.5 total. Prepare to be underwhelmed by the bats.
Thursday Night Pitching
This is one of those slates where you can make some sort of case for almost every pitcher on the board. I’ll start by sorting into a couple different buckets.
FOUR ACES
Aaron Nola vs Mets
Shane McClanahan at Mariners
Robbie Ray vs Rays
Logan Webb vs Cardinals
PLENTY OF GOOD MID-TIER PITCHING
Jose Urquidy vs Tigers
Tarik Skubal at Astros
Jesus Luzardo at Padres
Miles Mikolas at Giants
Taijuan Walker at Phillies
Nick Martinez vs Marlins
CHEAP NONSENSE
Chris Archer at Orioles
WHO IS THE ACE?
If we’re looking for strikeouts, and we are, then Shane McClanahan is the ace of this slate based on 2022 numbers. Through five starts, we’re looking at a 39.3% K rate with good control and no fewer than seven strikeouts in any start. His pitch count looks likely to remain stuck in the 85-90 range, but with this type of per inning upside, that is plenty. The matchup is a plus for strikeouts, and until he gives us any kind of reason to doubt him, I’m in. Before I just crown him the SP1, let’s see what’s next.
If we include 2021-2022 numbers to get some larger sample size, then Aaron Nola and Robbie Ray both move into a three-way tie with McClanahan. All three sit between 29.3%-30.5% strikeouts with good control numbers since last season. What we’ve seen early in 2022 is continued elite control from Nola, while Ray is showing signs of reverting back towards his old issues. His strikeout ability plays in any matchup, but there are a lot of good plate skills in the Tampa lineup, and with his early struggles, I can’t put Ray up with McClanahan tonight. Nola is not quite at McClanahan’s per inning ability, and his matchup is not as good, but he has the more trustable track record. For me, on FD where the salaries are basically the same, I side with McClanahan as the SP1. On DK, $1,700 is a pretty big gap, and I will call Nola the SP1, but my first build will be a McClanahan/Nola combo.