Million Dollar Musings: Monday, May 15
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.
Well folks, I’m not going to start with a Happy Monday (although, obviously, I hope you have a VERY Happy Monday!). However, as a DFS analysis article, the only real way to start is by saying that this is messy slate for DFS. We have one good pitcher and then a whole bunch of overpriced options who are either in bad matchups or have questionable skills this season. On the hitting side, we have some massive Reds chalk in Coors Field on DK and then a huge glob of fantastic upside pivots all over the board. It’s not necessarily a bad thing to have a ton of good offense to pivot off of chalk, but in this case, it’s simply too much.
We’ll walk through both sides and try to narrow down the MLB DFS picks, but it’s going to be quite a bit of throwing bad darts on the pitching side vs. throwing good darts on the hitting side.
Monday Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings
This is a rough-looking pitching slate. Basically, we have Framber Valdez and then a bunch of decent pitchers in bad matchups, with some wild, high-strikeout pitchers in really tough matchups. I am going to list just 2023 stats here, not because I am done looking at 2022 stats, but because I am hoping to find something, anything else after Valdez, to jump out here.
One Ace and Some People With Arms
Framber Valdez vs. Cubs – 27.1% K, 4.8% BB, 2.38 ERA, 2.80 SIERA
Charlie Morton at Rangers – 21.9% K, 9.6% BB, 3.32 ERA, 4.39 SIERA
Pablo Lopez at Dodgers – 31.2% K, 7% BB, 3.47 ERA, 3.23 SIERA
George Kirby at Red Sox – 20% K, 1.7%, 2.62 ERA, 3.82 SIERA
Freddy Peralta at Cardinals – 27.1% K, 8.2% BB, 3.32 ERA, 3.80 SIERA
Merrill Kelly at A’s – 25.6% K, 11.1% BB, 3.18 ERA, 4.25 SIERA
Hunter Greene at Rockies – 29% K, 9.1% BB, 3.69 ERA, 3.75 SIERA
Alek Manoah vs. Yankees – 16.8% K, 13.1% BB, 4.83 ERA, 5.66 SIERA
There is really no way around Framber Valdez chalk tonight. On a slate filled with mediocre pitching in tough matchups, Valdez is basically the most consistent pitcher in the league and with a better matchup than any of the other pitchers who could be reasonably considered as pivots. Just like last season, he is piling up quality starts and easy innings with his elite ground balls and control, while even improving his strikeouts. Because of how weak the rest of the slate is around him, this is simply a Don’t Overthink It spot.
So far in 2023, the other pitcher who has been an ace is Pablo Lopez. His 31.2% K rate leads this slate by a wide margin, and he’s thrown at least 6+ innings in six of his eight starts. He’s gotten a little better against lefties this season, but this is still a very splitsy guy who is basically a shut-down ace against righties but with control and fly ball questions against lefties. In almost any other matchup, he’d be a clear SP2 for me on this slate. But against the Dodgers, it’s scary. He is absolutely going to be in my MME pool, as is everyone here, but at this salary, he’s just a leftover.
