Free Premium! Million Dollar Musings: Friday, May 26

by Dave Potts (CheeseIsGood) Last Updated 2023-05-27 03:05:19

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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 Friday! We have a Harvey Wallbanger of a 12-game slate tonight, with the Mets in Coors Field, the Astros in Oakland, and a ton of strong pitching. I should point out that I have no idea at all what a Harvey Wallbanger is, but it was for some reason the term that jumped in my head after barn-burner. Anyhow, it’s a really fun slate, so feel free to use your own adjectives.

For the size of the slate, I end up with a fairly condensed primary pool on both sides, but just know that this one of those slates where you could very reasonably end up with a completely different way to rank your favorite MLB DFS picks. With that out of the way, let’s get to it!

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Friday Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings

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We have a ton of great pitching, with most of the good pitchers in solid matchups as well. I’ll walk through my favorites, but this is one of those slates where you could very reasonably have a completely different top tier than me, with more or fewer options. I’m going to start with a 12-man tier up top, broken into a couple buckets that I’ll whittle down and separate as much as possible.

ACES GALORE

Kevin Gausman at Twins – 31.9% K, 4.3% BB, 3.14 ERA, 2.84 SIERA
Mitch Keller vs. Mariners – 30.7% K, 5.6% BB, 2.44 ERA, 3.08 SIERA

Hunter Brown at A’s – 26.8% K, 8.1% BB, 3.20 ERA, 3.54 SIERA
Reid Detmers vs. Marlins – 29.8% K, 9.6% BB, 4.87 ERA, 3.69 SIERA
Chris Sale at Diamondbacks – 29% K, 6.1% BB, 5.01 ERA, 3.35 SIERA

George Kirby vs. Pirates – 20.4% K, 2.2% BB, 2.62 ERA, 3.83 SIERA
Shane Bieber vs. Cardinals – 17.8% K, 5.7% BB, 3.08 ERA, 4.47 SIERA
Jon Gray at Orioles – 18.4% K, 8.7% BB, 3.02 ERA, 4.88 SIERA

Freddy Peralta vs. Giants – 24.3% K, 9.9% BB, 4.15 ERA, 4.32 SIERA
Jesus Luzardo at Angels – 26.3% K, 7.5% BB, 3.83 ERA, 3.90 SIERA
Grayson Rodriguez vs. Rangers – 26.2% K, 9.4% BB, 6.21 ERA, 4.03 SIERA
Max Scherzer at Rockies – 22.6% K, 9.5% BB, 4.01 ERA, 4.73 SIERA

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I’ve started with four separate groups among these top 12, though these are pretty arbitrary lines. Basically, it’s the top group of Gausman and Keller over 30% strikeouts, then I’ve put Hunter Brown up with Sale and Detmers because of his matchup. The next group has lower-strikeout options, with George Kirby being the standout in the better matchup. The last group has a bunch of wild cards, all of whom have slate-winning upside with question marks.

Kevin Gausman appears to have ironed out his velocity issues, and outside of two wonky starts, he has been fantastic all season. The strikeouts have been a little up-and-down, but he’s already spiked four double-digit strikeout games. Tonight he faces a Twins team that has the second highest strikeout rate in the league against right-handed pitching. Add in his huge pitch count ceiling, and he’s the clear SP1 on this slate for me. DK has basically priced all these guys close enough that it’s a play-whoever-you-want situation. FD has a slightly bigger gap but also the cheaper bats to make him a pretty easy fit as the SP1.

I don’t know what else Mitch Keller has to do to earn everyone’s trust, but he has earned mine. We are looking at nine straight quality starts and a massive 47:3 K:BB ratio in his last 33 innings. He has mowed down better lineups than Seattle, who is one of the highest strikeout lineups in the league. This is a deep enough pitching slate that you don’t have to play him here, but for me, the number of options on the slate just means I can get an upside ace at low-ish ownership. He’s my SP2, and it is quite possible to play him and Gausman together on DK. I like him even more on FD, where the $300 salary doesn’t really mean anything, but it should help push his ownership further below Gausman.

So, that’s my Tier 1-A with Gausman and Keller.

From there, it’s gets trickier, and I’m picking and choosing names from the different buckets. The matchups for Hunter Brown and George Kirby are standouts and should boost both their projections and ownership. However, Kirby is still a bit of a ‘better in real life’ pitcher, so he is not going to be a heavy priority for me on a slate with so many strikeout pitchers. I’m completely comfortable with him in any lineup on any site, but he’s probably not going to make my primary lineups on FD. I very slightly prefer Hunter Brown over Kirby, but it’s so close to a toss-up that I’ll be splitting my exposure.

The more interesting question is if we want to skip Kirby and Brown to take shots on higher-strikeout arms like Chris Sale, Freddy Peralta, and Reid Detmers. You could also consider Grayson Rodriguez and Jesus Luzardo in this bunch.

As much as I don’t love picking on Arizona, Chris Sale just looks too much like vintage Chris Sale to worry about it. He’s faced a very tough run of matchups and has had no issue with them. His strikeouts are up there with Gausman and Keller, and he’s topped 110 pitches in back-to-back starts. He’s my tournament SP3, though I’d probably steer you towards Kirby ahead of him in cash games.

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I like the matchup for Freddy Peralta, but in the context of this slate, I just can’t get excited about his wonky control and strikeouts that have dropped off. To be fair, his lower strikeouts this season have been in very tough matchups, and the upside is still here. I would need more discount here for him to make my primary pool. I wouldn’t argue with you if you put Peralta ahead of Sale, but for me, they are flipped.

I’m more intrigued by what we’ve seen from Reid Detmers, though I’m certainly not expecting another 12-K outing. I don’t love the control here much more than I do with Peralta, but he’s been bit by a lot of bad BABIP, which should straighten itself out against Miami. It’s a weird matchup on the strikeout side, with Miami overall being slightly below average. But it’s really just four contact bats, with the rest offering him plenty of upside. He’s a tick below Sale, Kirby, and Brown…but in the mix. Because he comes at a useful discount on both sites, he is more likely to move up my board and end up as my third highest-owned pitcher.

I don’t really want to say that I’m crossing out any of these pitchers, but I’m pretty close to out on Shane Bieber, Jon Gray, and Max Scherzer. Bieber is still an excellent real-life pitcher, but I don’t want low strikeouts against the Cardinals on this slate. Jon Gray is also pitching much more like a better-in-real-life pitcher, and the Orioles present a little too much lefty power risk for me to love. And then Max Scherzer is not even all about Coors Field, it’s just about him not looking like Max Scherzer. It’s pretty clear they are going to limit him, and he just isn’t showing anything like his usual strikeout ability. I need to see it before I chase it on this kind of slate.

So that leaves Grayson Rodriguez and Jesus Luzardo as wild cards with upside. They are similar to Reid Detmers, with plenty of upside but still a lot of unknown. I’m extremely confident that Grayson Rodriguez is going to be an ace but just a quick glance at the results shows that he’s not there yet. Everything is all over the map, from the strikeouts, to the walks, to the power. Against the Rangers, this is just more risk than I feel the need to take tonight. Jesus Luzardo has also had power issues—and the Angels don’t help that—but he has been steadier than Rodriguez. Where I land on this is that, if I didn’t have so much love for the top 5-6 options, I’d be in here. But as it is, he doesn’t make my first 20+ lineups.

CAN WE MESS AROUND?

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Joe Musgrove at Yankees
Matthew Liberatore at Guardians
Alex Wood at Brewers
Jared Shuster vs. Phillies
Brandon Pfaadt vs. Red Sox
Randy Vasquez vs. Padres

The short answer to ‘can we mess around’ is no.

Here’s the situation…

On FD, as always, there are loads of strong hitters right around the $3k mark. There are only eight hitters total who cost $4,000 or more, and unless you just have to get those guys, you don’t need to punt at pitcher. With Reid Detmers all the way down at $8,300, that’s where I’m stopping. If you really want to throw a dart at something like Alex Wood or Joe Musgrove, have at it, but I just don’t see it as being necessary.

On DK, they have rolled the pitcher pricing back enough that even going with the two most expensive arms on the slate leaves you with $3,700 per bat. There will probably be a few builds where you want to try a cheap SP2, but it’s a scary risk to take. My initial lean here is that, because I like Reid Detmers at just $7,700, if I’m going to punt, I really want to punt.

That is drawing my eye towards the minimum salary Yankees rookie, Randy Vasquez. There is all kinds of risk here with a major league debut against the Padres, but he’s $4,000. He is a 25% strikeout pitcher in the minors, with some borderline control and a slight ground ball lean. He’s been a 5-6 inning guy in the minors, and I only expect to see something like a 5-inning start here. This is not about chasing huge upside; this is all about the salary. I could kind of make a similar case with Brandon Pfaadt. But we’ve seen four starts from him, and it’s all been shaky enough that, against the Red Sox, I’d much rather just save the extra salary with Vasquez.

Matthew Liberatore is someone to like moving forward, but I question what they are going to do with his pitch count. After a full start, they used him for an inning out of the bullpen over the weekend. That doesn’t really hurt his potential pitch count—they could just view that as a throwing day between starts—it’s just all kind of weird. He’s priced so close to Detmers that I just don’t really care for it.

If I need to mess around and get caught in between Detmers and Vasquez, I guess it’s Alex Wood. A lefty against the Brewers is a good enough matchup for his average skills. But he has yet to reach five innings this season and hasn’t topped 75 pitches in five starts. It’s such low upside on a slate filled with upside aces that I can’t recommend it.

PITCHING CLIFF NOTES

Like I said at the top, you could very reasonably have a different top tier than me, either bigger, smaller, or with a completely different ranking of the top half dozen or so options. This is how it shakes out for me.

Kevin Gausman and Mitch Keller are far-and-away my two favorite options. I assume Gausman will be the chalk, but there are enough good pitchers that I’m not too concerned about it. Anywhere I have the option to use Gausman and Keller together, that’s what I’m doing.

Next, I go to Chris Sale, followed by Hunter Brown and George Kirby.

I might be a little too high on Reid Detmers compared to Freddy Peralta and Jesus Luzardo, but that’s where I’m at. Detmers is basically in the Brown/Kirby/Sale tier, while Peralta and Luzardo are a notch below.

I’m OK to skip Shane Bieber, Jon Gray, Max Scherzer, and Grayson Rodriguez. I won’t yell at you for including them in your pools, but they will miss mine.

As for cheaper stuff, I prefer to just not mess with it. But at least on DK, it might be necessary somewhere, and I’m just skipping all the way down to Randy Vasquez.

Friday Hitting: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings

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There is plenty of offense to like tonight, but I do see a pretty clear top tier, led of course by the Mets traveling to Coors Field. I start with three buckets that look something like this:

TOP TIER OFFENSE

NY Mets at Connor Seabold
Houston Astros at James Kaprielian
Atlanta Braves vs. Taijuan Walker

TIER TWO OFFENSE

Boston Red Sox at Brandon Pfaadt
LA Angels vs. Jesus Luzardo
Philadelphia Phillies at Jared Shuster
KC Royals vs. Patrick Corbin
Colorado Rockies vs. Max Scherzer
Washington Nationals at Jordan Lyles
Toronto Blue Jays at Louie Varland
SD Padres at Randy Vasquez

TIER THREE OFFENSE

Milwaukee Brewers vs. Alex Wood
SF Giants at Freddy Peralta
NY Yankees vs. Joe Musgrove
Baltimore Orioles vs. Jon Gray
Texas Rangers at Grayson Rodriguez

TOP TIER TRIO

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Mets-Astros-Braves

The first few teams in my second tier could be brought up into this group, but I want to start with as tight of a top tier as possible. That leaves me with the obvious Coors Field spot for the Mets, the obvious Astros against Oakland, and the slightly less obvious Braves against Taijuan Walker.

For the Mets, it’s not just the Coors Field factor; they would be a top offense in this matchup at any ballpark. Connor Seabold looks out of his league, with a .264 ISO to righties, a .272 ISO to lefties, and low strikeouts to both sides of the plate. Pete Alonso is the very clear top target here and a top bat on the slate, and past him, only Francisco Lindor and Brandon Nimmo are priced up. The way this Mets lineup sets up, they work better as a stack outside of Alonso, who has clear slate-breaking upside on his own. The two other Mets I’m looking at on their own are Brett Baty and Francisco Alvarez, mostly on DK where they are too cheap for this matchup.

My early morning hunch is that the Mets and Astros soak up a similar amount of ownership, leaving most everything else on the slate a little overlooked. If all these games were being played in the same ballpark, Houston would be the massive clear chalk. James Kaprielian has no business in a major league rotation with his 8.68 ERA and 5.83 SIERA, especially after his 5.04 SIERA last season. Yordan Alvarez is ahead of Pete Alonso on my list for top bat of the slate, and Kyle Tucker is no lower than third. Kaprielian has slightly more strikeout ability to righties but still scary-bad batted ball numbers and control. With the contact from Jose Altuve and Alex Bregman at the top of the lineup, if I’m spending up on a full stack, this is the one I’m starting with. I will just wait and see who is in the starting lineup to choose salary savers, but any of the cheap Houston outfielders are primary values.

The Braves are a little less clear, as Taijuan Walker continues to bounce around between jabroni-ville and showing signs of his old talent. He’s definitely a better pitcher than Seabold or Kaprielian, and if we get the good Walker, then the Braves are just in the second-tier jumble. This means that for high-end one-offs, I’m not prioritizing these guys ahead of Mets and Astros. But for a full stack, the upside is every bit as high.

STARTING TO JUMBLE

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Red Sox-Angels-Phillies-Royals

Rockies-Nationals-Blue Jays-Padres

I’m going to start with these two buckets within this jumbled second tier.

I will absolutely be stacking all eight of these teams in my first 20-30 lineups tonight, but I find a little more interest in individual bats in this group:

Salvador Perez and Bobby Witt vs. Patrick Corbin – We are always looking for righty power against Corbin, and these two are the clear standouts. Cheaper righties like Edward Olivares and Maikel Garcia are OK, but for the most part, it’s Perez and/or Witt in primary lineups.

Mike Trout and Hunter Renfroe vs. Jesus Luzardo – Sure, you can stack against Luzardo. But his control has gotten enough better that, combined with his strikeout ability, I prefer hunting for some righty power. He is allowing a 50% fly ball rate with 40% hard hits this season, leading to a .227 ISO against RHB. There is some intriguing cheaper stuff like Brandon Drury, and even guys like Chad Wallach and Zach Neto, but the clear standouts here are Trout and Renfroe.

Rafael Devers and Boston Stack at Brandon Pfaadt – The early returns for Pfaadt have not been promising. While I still very much believe in his talent, he probably needed a little more time in the minors. He’s not getting strikeouts, and he’s not keeping the ball on the ground. This is an obvious problem against any lineup, and with the top half of the Boston lineup making contact at a high rate, he’ll have a tough time surviving this one. Devers is yet another elite spend-up on this slate.

Phillies Stack at Jared Shuster – We’re already running into a problem of having too many obviously fantastic bats to spend up on. So at this point, I’m out of spots to prioritize guys like Trea Turner and J.T. Realmuto on their own. I’m also not going to be able to prioritize Bryce Harper and Kyle Schwarber against Shuster, so that leaves me with the Phillies as a full-stack pivot in larger-field tournaments.

We take another little step down to the next four teams in my second tier:

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Ryan McMahon and Charlie Blackmon vs. Max Scherzer – You can always stack the Rockies at home of course, but they are a ways down the list tonight. What we’ve seen from Scherzer this season is an extreme split, far beyond what we’re used to. He’s always been better against righties, but through 72 PA against lefties this season, he’s all the way down at a laughable 15.3% K rate with fly-ball and hard-hit issues. I expect him to improve on that, but for now, I’m playing lefties against him.

Nationals Stack at Jordan Lyles – Lyles is a jabroni. However, it’s much tougher to use the Nationals bats against right-handed pitching. Something has to give in this matchup, and from what I see, Lyles is just too bad at throwing baseballs. And the big fly ball lean plays perfectly into the Nationals’ hands, with their biggest issue being the ground ball rates. I don’t like them much compared to these other teams straight-up, but salary is a thing. When accounting for these prices, mostly just on DK, they become a 2nd tier stack.

Blue Jays Stack vs. Louie Varland – This one is similar to the Phillies. Because of how much great stuff there is to target at the high-end, I can’t quite prioritize guys like Vladimir Guerrero and Bo Bichette on their own. They are certainly playable and in the MME pool, but I’m more interested in just full stacking the Blue Jays. While Varland is a solid pitcher, the reverse splits he’s shown this season bode well for this Toronto lineup.

SD Padres at Randy Vasquez – Who knows! I am not going to pretend to be able to tell you what happens with Vasquez in his first major league start. What I will tell you is that I have enough things that I love ahead of San Diego, so it’s nothing more than an MME flier for me.

LEFTOVERS AND MAYBES

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While I do draw yet another line of demarcation here, there is a path to any of these leftovers being a slate-winning team.

But to reiterate what I said in the blurbs about the Phillies and Blue Jays, the further we get down the list, the tougher it is to warrant spending up on expensive bats in primary lineups.

Aaron Judge is always an exception to that, but he’s really the only one in this tier that makes my primary pool.

I can certainly make some case for Willy Adames, Cedric Mullins, Adley Rutschman, Anthony Santander, Corey Seager, Adolis Garcia, Gleyber Torres, etc., etc. And while the teams are not in this list, this is also where I drop in the likes of Jose Ramirez, Paul Goldschmidt, Nolan Arenado, Nolan Gorman, Byron Buxton, and Jorge Soler.

But I’m mostly just at the MME-stacking point or value-hunting once I get to this tier. My favorite stack of the bunch is Texas, as we’ve seen some extremely rough outings from Rodriguez so far, and my next stop will be the Yankees. My main focus here are bats under $3,500 on DK that I can use as fill-ins around higher-priced stacks. My favorites of that group are the Giants bats, with power upside from guys like Michael Conforto and LaMonte Wade.

HITTING CLIFF NOTES

This is a big slate with a lot to like, so I glossed over a lot of it to keep things as un-jumbled as possible. I am going to be fairly spread out early on, but I do have a few dividing lines in both stacks and one-offs. This is how it all shakes out:

TIER 1 STACKS – Mets, Astros, Braves

TIER 2 STACKS – Red Sox, Phillies, Nationals (DK), Royals

LEFTOVER STACKS – Blue Jays, Padres, Angels, Rockies, Rangers

TIER 1 SPEND-UPS – Yordan Alvarez, Pete Alonso, Kyle Tucker, Rafael Devers, Mike Trout

TIER 2 SPEND-UPS – Bobby Witt, Salvador Perez, Francisco Lindor, Aaron Judge, Cedric Mullins, Matt Olson, Ronald Acuna

LEFTOVER SPEND-UPS – Fernando Tatis, Juan Soto, Jose Ramirez, Jorge Soler, Vladimir Guerrero, Paul Goldschmidt, Corey Seager, Adolis Garcia, Hunter Renfroe