Covering The Bases: MLB DFS Picks for Sunday, June 23rd
Long-time grinder, stlcardinals84, 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 favorite MLB DFS picks.
Happy Sunday, Grinders! We have a nine game slate of baseball on tap for us today, and this looks to be one of the most exciting Sunday slates for pitching that I have written up all season. There’s not much to love for bats today, and I would expect this to be a lower scoring day. However, with that jinx firmly in place and the weather heating up across the country, we can likely queue up several teams piling on the runs this afternoon.
We do have some weather concerns this afternoon, highlighted by an early ORANGE/YELLOW rating in the TB/PIT game at PNC Park this afternoon. Of course, it’s also Paul Skenes day in Pittsburgh, so you know they are going to try to get the game in. I am going to write the article assuming every game plays, but be sure to keep an eye on our MLB Weather page that Roth updates leading up to lock for all the latest news.
Let’s dig in and see what this Sunday has to offer for MLB DFS picks!
Sunday Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings
A LOADED TOP TIER OF ARMS
Paul Skenes vs. Rays (weather pending)
Sonny Gray vs. Giants
Nick Lodolo vs. Red Sox
Max Fried vs. Yankees
Logan Webb vs. Cardinals
Bryce Miller vs. Marlins
Max Scherzer vs. Royals
This tier of aces is not going to disappoint, and it’s about time that we have a strong pitching slate here on a weekend. As usual, let’s start with a peek at the 2024 data:
Skenes – 2.29 ERA, 2.16 xFIP, 34% K, 5% BB
Gray – 2.95 ERA, 2.77 xFIP, 31% K, 7% BB
Lodolo – 2.76 ERA, 3.54 xFIP, 26% K, 6% BB
Fried – 3.11 ERA, 3.26 xFIP, 23% K, 8% BB
Webb – 2.99 ERA, 3.08 xFIP, 21% K, 5% BB
Miller – 3.46 ERA, 3.90 xFIP, 24% K, 7% BB
Scherzer – 2024 season debut
If we are strictly looking at the data above, it’s pretty clear that Paul Skenes is the SP1 on this slate. He has the lowest ERA, the lowest xFIP, the lowest walk rate, and the highest strikeout rate of the entire group. It doesn’t get much easier to break down than that. He’s pitching at home against a beatable Rays offense that does have some higher strikeout bats. However, we do have weather concerns in Pittsburgh today, and if the weather cooperates, we are going to see super high ownership on Skenes. He was upwards of 50% owned on both FD and DK in his last start.
I mention that to make the point that while I really like Skenes and agree that he projects as the best play, if he is going to be super popular, I think there’s some intrigue in pivoting away from him in GPP builds on a slate that is loaded with arms. Sonny Gray is the next in line in terms of strikeout rate, but he faces a below average strikeout team in the Giants and has not topped 95 pitches in a single start all season. That limits his ceiling a bit.
My favorite GPP pivot is going to be Nick Lodolo. Both Skenes and Lodolo have strikeout prop numbers sitting at 7.5 today, and Lodolo matches up very well against a Red Sox team that has issues against left-handed pitching. They rank below average in team ISO and have the highest strikeout rate in the league so far this year against LHP, making this a great upside spot for Lodolo. I will be extremely overweight on him today.
Max Fried, Logan Webb, and Bryce Miller are all viable as well. Fried is a little less interesting for me today given his lower strikeouts and his matchup against the Yankees in Yankee Stadium. Webb also has lower strikeouts but makes up for that by pitching deep into games, and he gets to face a Cardinals team that is banged up and has a pretty weak bottom half of the order right now. Miller will be my favorite of the three, as he brings a little more strikeout potential to the table and faces a Marlins team that ranks near the bottom of the league in most offensive metrics.
Max Scherzer is the wild card ace on this slate. He hasn’t made a major league start yet this season, so we can expect the Rangers to ease him back into action. However, he did get up to 79 pitches in his last rehab start, so he is largely stretched out. We’re largely making educated guesses as to pitch count here, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see 70 pitches, nor would it surprise me to see 90 pitches. I don’t think it’s necessary to go here on a deep slate for arms, but I wouldn’t argue too vehemently against it if you have conviction on him.
SECONDARY PITCHING OPTIONS
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