Million Dollar Musings: Friday, March 31
CheeseIsGood, a two-time winner of a $1,000,000 first place prize in DFS, is here to give you his musings on the upcoming MLB DFS slate. Whether you are looking for the top pitchers or the best stacks, Cheese has you covered with an extensive deep dive into his MLB DFS picks.
Happy Day Two! Well, that was Opening Day. It started off almost like everything was going to go as planned with the first strikeout, stolen base and home run of the season going to Gerrit Cole, Ronald Acuna and Aaron Judge. But then of course, baseball happened and that makes it a good time to reiterate exactly why I said what I said yesterday. In the first start of the year, we have no way of knowing which players are going to be in mid-season form, and who is going to come out of the gates slowly (hello Corbin Burnes, what was that?). This is why I am going to continue to talk about spreading out exposures early on, until we start to get some sort of baseline for where these guys are at. Jacob deGrom allowed five runs in less than four innings, while Logan Webb piled up 12 strikeouts. Baseball is back!
We have a small five-game slate tonight, and while there is a big drop-off in the pitching talent from yesterday, we still have decent arms everywhere that will keep the offenses from popping as must plays. I’ll walk through everything on both sides and see what MLB DFS picks we can find for the first of many Friday nights!
Friday Night Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings
We’ll Call This The Top Tier
Cristian Javier vs White Sox – 33.2% K, 8.9% BB, 2.54 ERA, 3.14 SIERA
Robbie Ray vs Guardians – 27.4% K, 8% BB, 3.71 ERA, 3.50 SIERA
Jesus Luzardo vs Mets – 30% K, 8.8% BB, 3.32 ERA, 3.28 SIERA
David Peterson at Marlins – 27.8% K, 10.6% BB, 3.83 ERA, 3.57 SIERA
Lance Lynn at Astros – 24.2% K, 3.7% BB, 3.99 ERA, 3.35 SIERA
Dustin May vs Diamondbacks (career stats – 25.3% K, 7.2% BB)
After the ace-filled opening slate, this is a bit of a depressing group of starters tonight. We do have four pitchers with strikeout rates above 27% last season, but they all come with sketchy control and/or a lack of track record. On top of the weaker skills, this group also finds themselves in tougher matchups than what the Opening Day aces saw. These are pretty much low strikeout lineups across the board, making it less likely that we see a Cole-type performance from anyone in this group.
For me, the top pitcher is very clearly Cristian Javier. Javier was a strikeout machine last season, and while the walk rate is not great, he did have plenty of starts where he showed solid control. I don’t love the matchup, but I don’t love any of the matchups. Working in his favor, the White Sox are again a more right-handed lineup, with their top hitters on that side of the plate where Javier was lights out with a 39.7% strikeout rate last season. I am not going all-in on a pitcher with borderline control and a huge fly ball lean, but for my SP1 in primary lineups, give me the biggest strikeout pitcher on the slate with Javier.
From there, my assumption is that Robbie Ray will be the next most popular option, mostly due to name recognition. I still like Ray a good bit for this season, but clearly his immaculate 2021 season was an outlier and a career year. He still owns those skills, but the two years surrounding it, he has been basically a 27% strikeout pitcher with home run issues. That’s fine, but those are not ace numbers. Cleveland’s lineup is again filled with mostly low strikeout bats, and I really just don’t love this setup for Ray. I’ll be playing plenty of him on DK simply due to the size of the slate, but I vastly prefer Javier even before accounting for the salary.
Now we get even dicier with the other strikeout pitchers squaring off in Miami. First off, nothing against David Peterson, but it’s gotta be such a continuous bummer to be a Mets fan. Seriously, they lose deGrom, and then expect to have a Scherzer/Verlander double ace combo, and we’re just one day into the season and Peterson is already the Game 2 starter. Yikes.
OK, so David Peterson – Three seasons in the majors, three seasons above a 10% walk rate. One season, 2022, with a strikeout rate above 24%. Eight walks in 12 spring training innings, though with 13 strikeouts. Only reached six innings four times in 19 starts last season. I’m just not a fan of this guy right now. The good news here is that the Marlins don’t like to walk, and they are also the Marlins. It’s a small slate, and the guy is super cheap on DK, so yeah, he’s in the pool. But I am not inviting him to play the first game of Marco Polo.
The reality of Jesus Luzardo has not been all that much better than Peterson, but his 2022 season did finally hint at his longtime prospect status and pedigree with a 30% strikeout rate. And while his control is also not great, it’s better than Peterson, and basically the same as Javier/Ray. There is still time and hope for Luzardo to make a real step up to becoming the ace he was expected to be, but for now, even if we just assume he is the pitcher we saw last season, I’ve got to call him my favorite tournament SP2 ahead of Ray. Like with everyone tonight, I don’t love the matchup, but it’s about the same as everyone else’s. Hopefully he just saves his few walks for Alonso.
While the strikeout rate dipped in 2022, Lance Lynn also drastically improved his control to a career best 3.7% walk rate, which was all the way down to 2.9% in the second half. While the Astros are a tough opponent, the numbers are just not all that different from what any of these other pitchers are facing tonight. There are quite a few strikeouts in the back half of this lineup, and despite the lower projection and higher salary, I find myself being much more interested in Lynn than I expected to be when I first glanced at this slate. As of 8am when I’m writing this, I can already tell you that this is the first place of many this season when I’m torn on what to say. Officially, I don’t disagree with the projections that say Lynn is something like the 5th-7th best option tonight. But unofficially, I suspect he will be my SP3.
Dustin May presents an interesting conundrum. Sort of like Luzardo, he is supposed to be good, and sometimes, he’s been good. However, we have ridiculously small sample size, with no more than 56 innings in any season, and only 11 starts over the past two years. Not only has he not pitched much, he wasn’t even good when did pitch last season with just a 22.8% K rate and a slate high 11% walk rate. The best news on him is that he threw 94 pitches in his last spring start, so we can hope that he gets the Dodgers version of a full start tonight, which would be 5-6 innings. Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but the matchup is not great for strikeouts. Because of the state of this pitching slate, my lean here is to give May the benefit of the doubt and look at his career numbers ahead of his shaky 2022 numbers. That would make him every bit as viable an SP2 as every other pitcher we’ve looked at past Javier. I officially have him just a skosh behind Luzardo, but ahead of Ray when accounting for salary and what I expect the ownership to be. But just a skosh.
By the way, if you’re curious, and I know you are…when you Google the definition of ‘skosh’, and it gives you an example of how to use the word in a sentence, this is what we are presented with: “the car could do with a skosh more room in the back.” Ummm, the car could do with a skosh more room in the back? This tells me that they still have humans writing the example sentences for Google, because robots know that nobody talks like that.
The Leftovers
Nick Martinez vs Rockies – 21.2% K, 9.2% BB, 3.47 ERA, 4.03 SIERA
Hunter Gaddis at Mariners – 7 IP in MLB, high strikeout pitcher in minors
Merrill Kelly at Dodgers – 22% K, 7.6% BB, 3.37 ERA, 4.01 SIERA
Kyle Freeland at Padres – 17.1% K, 6.9% BB, 4.53 ERA, 4.51 SIERA
If there’s a leftover who gains some steam today, it would be Nick Martinez of the Padres. This is partly due to his salary and partly due to a home matchup with the Rockies. Martinez has been bounced around between the bullpen and rotation, making it tougher to know where his baseline numbers are. Adding to that difficulty, he also spent several seasons in Japan, with 2022 being his first year back in an MLB uniform. Whatever numbers you look at, there’s just not much in the way of strikeouts, and nothing special with control or ground balls, or really anything. He looks like just an OK dude. And just an OK dude for $7,300 on DK and $7,600 on FD at home against the Rockies is good enough to include in the multi-entry pool on this slate, but officially, I just don’t like him.
I have no interest in the low strikeout Kyle Freeland against the Padres, and as much as Merrill Kelly is a pretty good real life pitcher, there’s just no world in which I’m playing him against the Dodgers at this salary.
So that leaves Hunter Gaddis as the cheapest option on both sites. I have zero Gaddis interest on FD, but at just $5,000 on DK, I guess it’s worth a look. We have no idea yet if Gaddis is going to be able to show any of his minor league strikeout talent in the majors, but a goofy low 12.5% K rate with 8.2% SwK in his two appearances last season do not inspire confidence. The bigger issue is that he was slated to begin the year in the bullpen and is acting as more of an emergency fill-in for the injured Triston McKenzie. I would be quite surprised if we see more than five innings here, though he is stretched out enough from spring that he shouldn’t have any crazy short leash or anything. I am going to stack the Mariners long before I put Gaddis in a lineup tonight and will only have him if it’s a salary necessity. But among this tier of pitchers, I guess I’ll call him my ‘favorite’.
PITCHING CLIFF NOTES
We’ve come a long way from yesterday and not at all in the right direction. Cristian Javier is far and away my top pitcher and almost certainly the chalk as well. However, let’s not pretend like he’s some sort of sure thing. If guys like deGrom, Burnes and Nola can have bad opening starts, obviously the same can be said for Javier. I will have to go out of my way to make sure I don’t play Javier in every lineup, but if I were just building 3-5 today, he would be in all of them.
From there, it’s a big-time spread-it-out slate for me. This is going to be a theme for the first couple weeks as we settle into the season to wait to see who is in mid-season form and who comes out of the gate a little rusty. I’m going to rank them like this:
Jesus Luzardo, Robbie Ray, Dustin May, Lance Lynn, David Peterson, Nick Martinez
I expect that I will have very close to a 25/25/25/25 split on Luzardo/Ray/May/Lynn. I just don’t like or dislike any of them enough to go any further than that. I’m happy to just know what I don’t know and build lineups accordingly.
Friday Night Bats: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings
The hitting situation mirrors the pitching situation. It’s all kind of OK, but also with nothing that is some kind of can’t-miss great spot. This is what I will call the top tier:
STACKS
SD Padres vs Kyle Freeland
LA Dodgers vs Merrill Kelly
Seattle Mariners vs Hunter Gaddis
You could certainly include Houston in here as well, but I’m going to leave them for my next little subsection, which we’ll get to in a second. For full stacking, the Padres, Dodgers and Mariners are my first three looks.
The Dodgers are not quite as strong a lineup as we saw last season, but this is still a very loaded lineup that is going to be a top option on most slates. The downside here to a stack is that Merrill Kelly just isn’t a bad pitcher, particularly against righties where he allowed just a .113 ISO and .261 wOBA last season. There is a clear lean to the lefties here, making Freddie Freeman, Max Muncy and David Peralta the build-around trio, and making rookie James Outman a highly likeable punt option at just $2,000 on DK and $2,200 on FD. Outman hit over .290 in back-to-back seasons at AA and AAA with solid power and a skosh of speed as well. I’m on board.
The Padres are in a similar-ish situation, where we have a very good lineup in one of the best matchups of the night, but still not some outstanding can’t-miss. Kyle Freeland is not good, but he’s also not terrible and it will require some things to go right for this to be a slate winning stack. The low strikeout numbers against lefties in this lineup all look very inspiring, but outside of Manny Machado and Xander Bogaerts at the top of the lineup, the rest of the numbers are a bit disappointing. Nelson Cruz finally started to look old with just a .134 ISO against lefties last season, and there is not a single hitter past those top two with an ISO above .170 or a wOBA above .330 against lefties. The slate dictates that this has to be one of the top stacks, but officially, I really only like Bogaerts and Machado. And even there, with ground balls factored in, I really only like Machado.
If you are a fan of goofy small sample sizes, then I have something to sell you. With all of 9 career PA against left-handed batters (so far this semester, he has been absent nine times. Nine times?), Gaddis has zero strikeouts and a 1.111 ISO, which would make him the worst pitcher in MLB against lefties. Nine times. Obviously, that means nothing. However, even in the minors, when he was striking out 30%+, this is a heavy fly ball pitcher with home run issues. Now we add in the fact that his strikeouts may not carry over, and I am in love with the Seattle stack. There is a wide range of outcomes here with a lot of unknown, but this is far and away my top stack on the board. Other than using Cal Raleigh as my primary catcher, I’m not going to overthink the splits, as I expect at least half a game against the bullpen, and the top Seattle bats are the righties Julio Rodriguez, Teoscar Hernandez, Ty France and Eugenio Suarez.
POWER BATS
Houston Astros vs Lance Lynn
Jose Ramirez and Friends at Robbie Ray
Pete Alonso and Friends at Jesus Luzardo
There are reasons to pick out a few bats everywhere tonight, but these three spots interest me most for power hunting.
Lance Lynn is a good pitcher, but he’s always had at least moderate issues with left-handed power, and those splits continued last year with a .176 ISO allowed to lefties and just a 20.8% K rate vs 28.7% to righties. I don’t love that Yordan Alvarez had some recurrence of his hand issues this spring, but he’s in the lineup, and he hit a homer on Opening Day. So as far as I’m concerned, he is good to go. He is one of the top power bats in the league with a .313 ISO against righties last season, and we can add Kyle Tucker to the list with his .211 ISO.
Robbie Ray is Robbie Ray, which means Robbie Ray will allow home runs, mostly to righties. The three Guardians bats with ISO’s above .175 against lefties also all have low strikeouts, which is exactly the combo you want against Ray. Jose Ramirez is the stand-out and a top option on this slate, and then I’ll go to Josh Bell and his 14.7% K rate with .175 ISO against lefties. Amed Rosario and Oscar Gonzalez would be the next two bats in when I start looking to stack.
Jesus Luzardo is still relatively young, but his numbers against righties look very Ray-ish, with plenty of strikeouts, but also control issues and hard-hit fly balls. Pete Alonso is the clear top bat here, but I also like Francisco Lindor, Starling Marte and Mark Canha. They all make decent contact and have at least moderate power and good lineup spots around Alonso.
LEFTOVERS
Miami Marlins vs David Peterson – I don’t trust Peterson as far as I can throw him (and with my bad knee, I shouldn’t be throwing anybody), but goodness gracious this Marlins team is just not good. I’m going to have some Garrett Cooper and Jorge Soler, and then I’ll have some stacks just because it’s a small slate with nothing great, but that’s all I can say here.
Chicago White Sox at Cristian Javier – Javier may be the best pitcher on this slate, but if he’s not striking someone out, then he’s allowing a fly ball, up over 50% to both sides of the plate. The White Sox make enough contact to think that somebody gets ahold of one, and I’d lean towards Tim Anderson and Luis Robert at the top of the lineup.
Colorado Rockies at Nick Martinez – Well, the Rockies look better than the Marlins, so there’s that.
Arizona Diamondbacks at Dustin May – Out of these leftover teams, the Diamondbacks are my favorite lineup in general. They have power with guys like Christian Walker and Lourdes Gurriel, and they have speed with guys like Corbin Carroll and Jake McCarthy. There are mostly low strikeout bats up and down the lineup along with a good mix of righties and lefties. I don’t really have any desire to attack May or a good Dodgers bullpen, but small slate, good lineup, sure I’ll end up with them as my 7th ranked stack. Yippee!
HITTING CLIFF NOTES
We made it all of one day into the season before we land on a slate where there’s nothing to love on either side of the ledger. But still, we’ve gotta play something, and here’s what those somethings are for me.
Favorite Stacks – Mariners, Dodgers, Padres, small gap, Guardians, Astros, Mets, Diamondbacks
Favorite Individual Bats – Manny Machado, Jose Ramirez, Pete Alonso, Yordan Alvarez, Freddie Freeman, Kyle Tucker, Josh Bell, Xander Bogaerts, Cal Raleigh, Julio Rodriguez, Max Muncy
Favorite Salary Savers
DK – James Outman, Cal Raleigh, David Peralta, Jarred Kelenic, Christian Walker, Gabriel Arias
FD – J.D. Martinez, David Peralta, James Outman, Josh Bell, Cal Raleigh, Jarred Kelenic, Kolten Wong, Mark Canha, Nelson Cruz, Ryan McMahon