Million Dollar Musings: MLB DFS Picks Today for Friday 5/23

by Dave Potts (CheeseIsGood) Last Updated 2025-05-23 15:24:42 Premium Content Part of the product MLB DFS

Whether you are looking for the top pitchers or the best stacks, Dave Potts (aka CheeseIsGood) has you covered with an extensive deep dive into his MLB DFS picks. Cheese, one of the preeminent baseball minds in all of fantasy sports and a winner of a $1,000,000 1st-place prize on both DraftKings and FanDuel, is here to give you his musings on the upcoming MLB DFS slate.

Happy Friday! We have a good old-fashioned barn burner of a 12-game slate with a ton of high-end pitching, and the hitting side is highlighted by one of the highest team totals of the season as the Yankees travel to Coors Field.

The first thing to note is that DK is including the 2nd half of the BAL/BOS doubleheader, while FD is not, making it an 11-game slate there.

As we dig into the plays, what you’ll notice when you look at projections in the MLB DFS optimizer is that there is no trick at all to spot the best plays and plenty of things you would be thrilled to have in any and all lineups. The trick is going to be deciding where to spend that salary cap with so much to love on both sides. Let’s dive in and see what happens.

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Friday Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings

We have a ton of pitching options that look to be appropriately priced in all different salary ranges. I’m going to use $7,500 as the cutoff for the top tier, but we could just as easily separate these guys into 3-4 different tiers. This is going to be one of those days where I talk through a ton of names, but as always, I’ll clear up my thoughts as precisely as possible when we get to the cliff notes.

TOP TIER PITCHING

• Zack Wheeler at A’s – 32.8% K, 4.9% BB, 2.67 ERA, 2.51 SIERA
• Nick Pivetta at Braves – 28.3% K, 7.6% BB, 2.86 ERA, 3.39 SIERA
• Chris Sale vs. Padres – 30.4% K, 6.3% BB, 3.62 ERA, 2.91 SIERA
• Pablo Lopez vs. Royals – 27.7% K, 5.1% BB, 2.40 ERA, 3.05 SIERA
• Tyler Mahle at White Sox – 18.8% K, 8.5% BB, 1.47 ERA, 4.37 SIERA
• Zac Gallen at Cardinals – 24.3% K, 10.3% BB, 5.14 ERA, 4.07 SIERA
• Noah Cameron at Twins – 2 career starts
• Yusei Kikuchi vs. Marlins – 21.3% K, 11.1% BB, 3.50 ERA, 4.49 SIERA
• Sandy Alcantara at Angels – 17.8% K, 12% BB, 7.99 ERA, 4.85 SIERA
• Clayton Kershaw at Mets – 2nd start of season
• Drew Rasmussen vs. Blue Jays – 22.2% K, 5.6% BB, 2.93 ERA, 3.52 SIERA
• Slade Cecconi at Tigers – 2nd start of season

You can argue for maybe a half-dozen pitchers overall, but in my book, Zack Wheeler is the best pitcher in the league. His consistency is unrivaled and even before this season’s strikeout surge, he had slate-winning upside every time he took the mound. Through 10 starts, he is at a career-high 32.8% K rate and a career-high 14.2% swinging strike rate. There is really nothing in his velocity, pitch type, Stuff+ or anywhere else that explains why he’s taken this much of a jump, so it’s certainly possible he lands closer to his still great 28.5% K rate from last season. Regardless of where the strikeouts land, he is always efficient in piling up easy innings, and he’s as matchup-proof as they come. None of that means he can’t have a bad start; he has allowed 4+ runs twice this season, but overall, he’s just so much better than everyone else that I’m willing to pay for it.

Before we move on, I’ll just say that there are a lot of good pitchers on this slate, and we also have the Yankees priced up at Coors Field. With all that factored in, this is not some sort of lock button must-play, but I do have Wheeler in his own tier way up at the top tonight, and my initial lean is to prioritize him over the Yankees bats. I’m also thinking that because of the extreme salary, he’s not going to end up being all that popular, which makes me like him even more.

After Wheeler, we have three more pitchers who are in the 28-30% K range – Nick Pivetta, Chris Sale, and Pablo Lopez. None of the three have great matchups, which makes me lean even more to Wheeler at SP1 despite the higher salary.

Pablo Lopez is basically a poor man’s Zack Wheeler. He’s good, he’s consistent, and he has upside. But while Wheeler hangs out in the 7-9 strikeout per start range, Lopez is more often around 5-6 strikeouts and rarely gets that extra inning that makes all the difference in DFS. He also faces a Royals team that has the lowest strikeout rate in the league against righties, so while I think he’ll be fine here, a ceiling game is not likely.

Nick Pivetta has plenty of upside, though it’s not showing up on a regular basis, and the Padres have been a little cautious with his workload, usually hanging around the 90-pitch mark. That’s fine, but he’s $10,300 on DK, and I can’t make a real case to play him ahead of Wheeler, making him just an MME pivot.

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