Covering the Bases: Saturday, August 26
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, with FanDuel and DraftKings offering largely matching slates for us to start the weekend. The only difference is that DraftKings is excluding CLE/TOR from their early slate, giving us a five-gamer that starts at 4 PM ET. FanDuel has that game on their early slate, giving us a six-gamer that starts at 3 PM ET.
College football also starts today, so it’s a glorious day on the sports calendar! Fall is arriving, even though it may not quite feel like it outside yet. 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
Tyler Glasnow vs. Yankees
Max Fried vs. Giants
Logan Gilbert vs. Royals
James Paxton vs. Dodgers
Hyun-Jin Ryu vs. Guardians [FD Only]
Eury Perez vs. Nationals
Julio Urias vs. Red Sox
This is a lot of solid pitching for a relatively small slate, and I would expect some strong performances by a few of these pitchers today. Let’s take a quick peek at the 2023 data:
Glasnow – 3.35 ERA, 2.79 xFIP, 33% K, 8% BB
Fried – 2.83 ERA, 3.11 xFIP, 23% K, 5% BB (48 innings)
Gilbert – 3.77 ERA, 3.73 xFIP, 25% K, 5% BB
Paxton – 3.79 ERA, 3.78 xFIP, 26% K, 7% BB
Ryu – 1.89 ERA, 3.95 xFIP, 20% K, 7% BB (19 innings)
Perez – 2.91 ERA, 3.80 xFIP, 30% K, 8% BB
Urias – 4.15 ERA, 4.10 xFIP, 24% K, 5% BB
If we’re looking at pure strikeout stuff, it’s Tyler Glasnow and then everyone else. Glasnow has a marvelous 33% strikeout rate on the year, and it’s not like the Yankees are a super dangerous opponent (outside of Aaron Judge) at the moment. Glasnow hasn’t finished with fewer than seven strikeouts in a single start since June 14th. He pitched seven strong innings with eight strikeouts in a start against the Yankees earlier in the year as well. While there’s always some risk of the Rays pulling him at 85-90 pitches, he generally has gotten to go longer this year when he has his “A” stuff. He’s my SP1 on the slate.
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