Covering the Bases: Saturday, August 19
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 Saturday, everyone! We have the usual split slate Saturday on tap for us today, but it’s a wonky one. Several West Coast teams have moved Sunday’s games up to today in order to avoid the rain that is going to drench the California coast later this weekend. That means we have three doubleheaders scheduled (TB/LAA, MIA/LAD, and ARI/SD).
DraftKings is rolling a four game early slate that starts at 1 PM Eastern, while FanDuel has split the early games up into two smaller slates. For purposes of this article, I am just going to touch on the DK early slate, as FD doesn’t have very big prize pools for their two different early slates. The main DK slate tonight has ten games, while FD is excluding Game 2 of all the doubleheaders and is rolling with a seven game main slate.
In any case, let’s move forward to see what this Saturday slate has to offer for MLB DFS picks!
Saturday Afternoon Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings
Gerrit Cole vs. Red Sox
Freddy Peralta vs. Rangers
Dane Dunning vs. Brewers
Cristopher Sanchez vs. Nationals
Kutter Crawford vs. Yankees
Justin Steele vs. Royals
Brady Singer vs. Cubs
You can at least make some sort of case for every pitcher on the early DK slate with the exception of Jake Irvin. The other seven are all listed here, and let’s start with a peek at the 2023 numbers:
Cole – 2.76 ERA, 3.68 xFIP, 27% K, 7% BB
Peralta – 4.08 ERA, 3.75 xFIP, 29% K, 9% BB
Dunning – 3.10 ERA, 4.30 xFIP, 19% K, 6% BB
Sanchez – 3.39 ERA, 3.54 xFIP, 23% K, 5% BB
Crawford – 3.80 ERA, 4.35 xFIP, 24% K, 6% BB
Steele – 2.79 ERA, 3.68 xFIP, 23% K, 5% BB
Singer – 4.91 ERA, 4.19 xFIP, 20% K, 7% BB
I am going to start by saying that I listed Steele and Singer at the bottom because I am simply excluding them today. We have a healthy 10-15 MPH wind blowing out to left at Wrigley Field today, and the risk for these two pitchers is higher than usual. Steele is a great real life arm, and I am a Singer truther just like Cheese, but today just isn’t the day. Their strikeout rates are both slightly below league average, and the weather just makes them an easy pass in this spot on a slate where we have plenty of options to choose from.
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