Covering the Bases: Monday, August 21
STLCardinals84, one of the best tournament players in the game, is here to cover the bases for the upcoming MLB DFS slate. Whether you are looking for the top pitchers or the best stacks, Cards has you covered with an extensive deep dive into his MLB DFS picks.
Happy Monday, everyone! I am sure we are all excited to get the new week started! The sports calendar is about to get very busy, as we have the first weekend of college football coming up this Saturday and the NFL regular season staring at us in two weeks. Until then, however, we’ve got a few more weeks where baseball is in the spotlight.
Congratulations to Cheese and to SquirrelPatrol for strong finishes in the DraftKings live final over the weekend! Cheese will be back with you tomorrow… but you have one more day with me until then.
This Monday brings us an eight game night slate with some interesting nuggets to discuss for both pitchers and hitters. Let’s dig in and try to uncover some strong MLB DFS picks for tonight!
Monday Night Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings
The Top Options
Luis Castillo vs. White Sox
Jordan Montgomery vs. Diamondbacks
Lucas Giolito vs. Reds
Michael Wacha vs. Marlins
We have some interesting choices to pick from on the mound tonight, but the slate lacks a dominant ace. That will likely serve to spread out ownership to some degree. Let’s see if the 2023 numbers can shed any light on a preferred choice.
Castillo – 3.23 ERA, 3.71 xFIP, 27% K, 6% BB
Montgomery – 3.30 ERA, 3.97 xFIP, 22% K, 6% BB
Giolito – 4.44 ERA, 4.45 xFIP, 25% K, 8% BB
Wacha – 2.68 ERA, 4.63 xFIP, 22% K, 7% BB
All four of these pitchers are priced within $1,000 of each other on both FanDuel and DraftKings, so you can largely ignore any salary differences among them. Given that bunched pricing, it is going to seem like Jordan Montgomery and Michael Wacha are overpriced. I would agree with that general assessment.
Montgomery and Wacha both have strong surface ERA metrics this year, but they have both also been helped out by some good fortune. That is particularly true with Wacha, who has pitched to a BABIP around 40 points better than his career mark this year. He also has a HR/FB rate that is around half of his career mark. Regression is coming at some point, and he’s simply overpriced right now. Both Montgomery and Wacha have strikeout rates slightly below league average, and I just don’t see a reason to pay a premium for them on this slate. There are plenty of affordable options that are also somewhat safe, and the cheaper route is the more optimal approach as it opens up salary for your bats.
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