Covering The Bases: MLB DFS Picks Today for Sunday 8/17

by Justin Van Zuiden (stlcardinals84) Last Updated 2025-08-17 14:23:48 Premium Content Part of the product MLB DFS

Long-time grinder, Justin Van Zuiden (aka stlcardinals84), is here to cover the bases for the upcoming MLB DFS slate on DraftKings and FanDuel. Whether you are looking for the top pitchers or the best stacks, Cards has you covered with an extensive deep dive into his favorite MLB DFS picks.

Happy Sunday, Grinders! We have an interesting Sunday slate on tap, with a 9-game docket on DraftKings and a 10-game docket on FanDuel, as FD has taken the usual Sunday approach of adding the Coors Field game to their slate. That makes the sites quite different today, as the Coors Field game just happens to have an over/under total of 13 runs!

This looks to be a relatively balanced slate, but it also looks to be one that will be difficult to break down. There is a pile of jumbled offense that is difficult to separate, and this one is going to be quite the challenge. Sundays often give us some differing lineup decisions from managers with players possibly getting days off, so keep an eye on our MLB Starting Lineups page to stay updated before lock. As always, it is also important to monitor the weather with our MLB weather page. The biggest concerns today lie in Minnesota and St. Louis, both of which Roth has given a “yellow” rating to start the day. I will write the article as though every game plays fine, but keep an eye on this as lineup lock gets closer.

Let’s dig in and see what today has to offer!

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Sunday Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings

TOP TIER ACES

Garrett Crochet vs. Marlins
Nathan Eovaldi vs. Blue Jays
Andrew Abbott vs. Brewers

We have a trio of aces at the top of the board today, and all of them have shown intriguing stuff in 2025. They are a deserving top group. As usual, we’ll begin with a look at the 2025 numbers:

Crochet – 2.48 ERA, 2.72 xFIP, 30.8% K, 6.5% BB
Eovaldi – 1.71 ERA, 3.04 xFIP, 25.6% K, 4.7% BB
Abbott – 2.41 ERA, 4.39 xFIP, 21.0% K, 7.0% BB

Garrett Crochet is your clear pitcher at the top of this list. He has the best xFIP of the group and the best strikeout rate by more than 5%. Two months ago, this would have been a very easy decision with Crochet as the SP1. However, the Marlins have been much peskier of late, and they have a sub-20% team strikeout rate over the past 14 days. In addition, Nathan Eovaldi is healthy again and looks to be back to his old self. This is not as obvious as it would have been in the first half of the year.

The issue is that Eovaldi doesn’t have a good matchup of his own. The Blue Jays have been on fire of late and put up 14 runs against Patrick Corbin and company on Saturday. Given that neither pitcher has a cakewalk of a matchup, I’ll side with the 31% strikeout rate of Crochet. He is my SP1 if I am spending up today, but it also must be noted that we have some high-end offense that you can spend up for. While Crochet is my choice up here, I do not think he is an absolute must play.

Andrew Abbott is well below the other two in this tier. His 21% strikeout rate is merely around league average, and his advanced metrics are not spectacular. As a fly-ball pitcher, he will almost always pitch to a lower ERA than his xFIP and SIERA indicate, but there’s still not a massive DFS ceiling. We also need to throw in the fact that he is facing a Brewers team that has won 14 games in a row and is 29-4 (somehow) over their last 33 games. This isn’t a team we want to pick on right now.

I am ranking this tier as Crochet > Eovaldi > Abbott today.

SECONDARY PITCHING OPTIONS

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