Million Dollar Musings: MLB DFS Picks for Saturday, May 18th
CheeseIsGood, 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. 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 Saturday! Your usual Saturday chief of operations is out for some fun and shenanigans today, so I’ll be walking you through this split slate. We’ll start with a quick peek at the early 6-game slate that begins at 1:05pm ET. Then I’ll be back shortly with a look at the evening slate, a 7-gamer at the usual 7:10pm ET start time.
Saturday Early Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings
We’ve got a pretty good pitching slate, but it does come with a couple of situations that are up in the air at the time I’m writing this. I am starting with the assumption that Dean Kremer gets the start for the Orioles, and Kyle Harrison starts for the Giants. But it’s also quite possible that we see Cole Irvin and Jordan Hicks in those spots. Just be sure to keep an eye on those games, and we should get clarity well before first pitch.
We sort of have some tiers here, but I’m just going to list all 9 pitchers that I’m looking at in one bucket and then we’ll sort through them from there.
Shota Imanaga vs. Pirates – 27.9% K, 4.4% BB, 0.96 ERA, 3.03 SIERA
Luis Gil vs. White Sox – 27.4% K, 14.9% BB, 2.51 ERA, 4.31 SIERA
Kevin Gausman vs. Rays – 22.6% K, 6.1% BB, 4.95 ERA, 3.65 SIERA
Luis Castillo at Orioles – 29% K, 5% BB, 3.31 ERA, 2.95 SIERA
Kyle Harrison vs. Rockies – 21.5% K, 8.1% BB, 3.42 ERA, 4.09 SIERA
Dean Kremer vs. Mariners – 25.3% K, 8.1% BB, 3.72 ERA, 3.65 SIERA
Luis Severino at Marlins – 21.5% K, 10.5% BB, 3.00 ERA, 4.10 SIERA
Zach Eflin at Blue Jays – 18.6% K, 1.8% BB, 3.91 ERA, 3.76 SIERA
Braxton Garrett vs. Mets – 2nd start of season
Well folks, at some point, Shota Imanaga is probably going to stop being the greatest pitcher of all time. It almost happened in his last start, but he again worked out of every jam for yet another scoreless outing to go along with 8 strikeouts in 5 innings. Today he gets a high-strikeout Pirates lineup, and he’s still priced just slightly ahead of the rest of this top tier. We do have other very good pitchers in good matchups here, but for me, is seems absurd to try and find a reason not to just play Imanaga everywhere. I might argue that Luis Castillo has the better skill set, but in that instance, the matchup is still strongly enough in Imanaga’s favor that he’s my clear SP1. I also don’t see him being super chalky in comparison to these other top tier pitchers, so I’m just playing him.
Since I just mentioned the skills of Luis Castillo, I’ll go to him next. He looks as steady and elite as ever, with 6 straight quality starts and 6-9 strikeouts in 8 consecutive starts. Sure, the matchup adds some power risk, but he’s had plenty of tough matchup already this season. My hunch is that Luis Gil and Kevin Gausman pick up more ownership than Castillo due to the better matchups and lower salaries, and while I have no issue with that, I’ll gladly play the more talented pitcher at lower ownership.
Castillo is a skosh behind Imanaga, and it’s not easy to play them both together, so I won’t call Castillo a priority, but he is my SP2.
Luis Gil gets the White Sox at home, and he comes slightly cheaper than Imanaga and Castillo on both sites. He’s continued to pitch well in real life, but the strikeouts have really dropped off while the control is still a big question mark. This is just all about the matchup, but as bad as the White Sox are, they are just about average in strikeouts. I do see Gil as a guy who still has ceiling potential, and I am not at all saying he’s a bad option here. I’m just saying that his skill set is too far behind Imanaga and Castillo for me to want to prioritize him if he’s the most popular of the three.
Kevin Gausman gets an even bigger discount, but he’s earned it by just not being great this season. His long-term numbers would still put him up at the top of this tier (or at least in line with the top two), but for now, I’m not thrilled to play an average strikeout pitcher who has just two quality starts in 8 outings this season. I like the salary on DK enough to leave him in the MME pool, and I wouldn’t argue with you if you had him ranked higher.
If we see Kyle Harrison for the Giants today, he is priced the same as Gausman on both sites. The skills are very close this season, and though Gausman is more trustable long term, I’d still rather play the pretty good pitcher in San Francisco against the Rockies. I have a cheaper pitcher ahead of him, so he’s still not a priority, but I do have him in the pool as my SP5.
I’m torn on whether or not to believe in the strikeout surge from Dean Kremer, but we’ve now seen 10 strikeouts twice in his last 4 starts. His full season 25.3% K rate puts him at 4th place on this slate, and he gets a high-strikeout matchup against the Mariners. I prefer him ahead of Gausman even before the discount, which makes him my primary SP2 if I need to go below $9,000 on DK.
I love Zach Eflin in real life, and I love the matchup in real life. But I don’t love either for DFS. He is a very low strikeout pitcher against a lineup that still doesn’t strike out a lot despite all their issues. He’s completely playable and in my pool for lineups where I go with double cheap pitchers, but I prefer Kremer.
Luis Severino still has an ERA that is hanging on, but the skills are just not tagging along for the ride. He has walked 3+ batters in 4 of his last 6 starts and has only topped 6 strikeouts once all season. The matchup is keeping him in the pool at this salary, but as with Luis Gil, while it’s a good matchup, it’s not a huge strikeout boost. All the pitchers in this tier are closely bunched, but I’ve got Severino behind Kremer and Eflin.
Braxton Garrett is the super cheap option at just $5,900 on DK. His first start of the season was a mixed bag, but to me, the 8 strikeouts in 5 innings outweighs the 5 runs. He threw 80 pitches, so there aren’t any big workload concerns. After seeing 13 strikeouts in his last rehab start and the 8 strikeouts against the Phillies, I’m assuming we see the same above-average pitcher we’ve seen the past few seasons. His career stat line puts him firmly in the middle of the 2nd tier, and personally, I would be considering him even at something like $7,500 on DK. I certainly prefer Kremer and Eflin, but not by all that much. There is a lot of guesswork here, and it could go south, but I’m going to be playing a lot of Garrett on DK.
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