Million Dollar Musings: MLB DFS Picks Today for Monday 5/19

by Dave Potts (CheeseIsGood) Last Updated 2025-05-19 16:42:07 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 Monday! We kick off the new week with an interesting 9-game slate that has a good bit of everything. We have a bit of a standout on the hitting side with the Phillies visiting Coors Field, but there is plenty of other high-end offense to compete with them. On the pitching side, we have a big top tier, but it lacks any obvious must-play ace, so I’m leaning towards this being a spread-out kind of slate. But as always, we’ll see what happens as we dig into things.

We have some dicey weather to worry about tonight, most notably with an Orange/Red rating for the CLE/MIN game on the MLB weather page. While I have players in that game in the analysis today, I am not going to have anyone from the game in my initial builds. We also have an Orange/Yellow in the DET/STL game, which will be important to keep an eye on later as one of the top-tier pitchers is in that game.

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Monday Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings

At first glance, I don’t see a clear correct answer here, and it looks like more of a spread-it-out kind of slate. I have 7 pitchers in my top tier, ranging from $7,800 to $10,000 on DK and then at least another 5 cheap options that I’ll consider. Also, be sure to note that while I have Bailey Ober and Sonny Gray listed here, there is some chance we lose one or both of them to the weather.

TOP TIER PITCHING

• Robbie Ray vs. Royals – 26.3% K, 12.4% BB, 3.04 ERA, 4.10 SIERA
• Kris Bubic at Giants – 25.6% K, 6.8% BB, 1.66 ERA, 3.44 SIERA
• Sonny Gray vs. Tigers – 24.8% K, 5.8% BB, 4.50 ERA, 3.50 SIERA
• Luis Castillo at White Sox – 18.2% K, 9.3% BB, 3.65 ERA, 4.62 SIERA
• Bailey Ober vs. Guardians – 19% K, 5.7% BB, 3.72 ERA, 4.27 SIERA
• Cristopher Sanchez at Rockies – 28.4% K, 9.3% BB, 2.91 ERA, 3.22 SIERA
• Ryan Pepiot vs. Astros – 21.2% K, 8% BB, 3.93 ERA, 4.11 SIERA

This is a very tough group to decipher. The worst pitcher so far this season is the one with the best matchup, and the best pitcher is in Coors Field. We then have several good pitchers who have seen a lot of ups and downs, with middle-of-the-road matchups that lack clarity.

I’ll start by saying this looks like exactly the kind of slate where the Robbie Ray Rule looks important. He now has 4 straight quality starts, though with 28 baserunners and no home runs in those four starts, we can certainly say things have gone his way. As always, matchup really doesn’t matter, and on top of that, there’s no clear way to gauge the matchup. The Royals are kind of supposed to be a good offense, but so far this season they are 27th in runs and dead last in ISO against left-handed pitching. The very early ownership projections show him getting a bit overlooked. I think that will correct itself a bit throughout the day, but I also don’t think he’ll end up being chalky at $10,000 on DK and $10,200 on FD. While I don’t have any strong leanings toward anyone, I am calling Ray my SP1.

My SP2 comes on the other side of this game with Kris Bubic. He’s been great since the start of last season, and while the ERA is fluky low, there are no real flaws anywhere in his skill set. The ballpark offsets the power risk, so if salary doesn’t matter, I’m starting with Ray and/or Bubic.

You can make the argument that Cristopher Sanchez is the most talented pitcher on this slate. In addition to his strikeout ability, his ground ball lean is a big plus in Coors Field. His control hasn’t been as sharp against righties this season, but the strikeouts have gone up to 29.4% against RHB. For me, the mixture of strikeouts and ground balls overrides the Coors Field factor on DK, where he’s priced down at $8,000. He’s my SP3 on DK, but I’m moving him down a bit on FD.

Bailey Ober is also priced down around Sanchez on DK and has an average matchup against Cleveland. Since his bad first start, he’s been solid and consistent, and I’d expect more of the same here. While he should be fine, I don’t love seeing just a 15.4% K rate against lefties so far this season and facing a team that could use 7-8 lefties against him. With the elite control, he can still be fine there, but there is not a ton of realistic upside. I prefer Sanchez, but Ober is also in the pool, just like all these guys.

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