Million Dollar Musings: Sunday, April 2
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 Sunday! While it’s fresh in our minds, I want to take this opportunity to point out an often over-looked reason to fade chalk stacks in MLB. What you usually hear is, “Well, the chalk can fail,” and yeah, that’s true. But much more than that, the chalk can be good, but other things can be better. You don’t need to dislike the chalk or expect them to fail to find a reason to fade it. Yesterday, the Braves chalk was pretty good with 7 runs, 11 hits and 4 HR. That’s not a fail. But it also wasn’t a slate winner, as we had teams like the Rays, Angels and Red Sox blowing past them. I’m pointing this out now, as particularly when we get into Coors Field slates, you’re going to hear me talk about this a lot. Sure, the chalk can fail, but let’s assume it doesn’t, and then figure out how to beat it anyway.
OK, with that out of the way, let’s jump into this 1:10pm ET, 10-game slate and see what MLB DFS picks we can pick out.
Sunday Pitching: MLB DFS Picks on FanDuel & DraftKings
This is the first ace-less slate of the season, with no pitchers reaching the 27% mark in strikeouts, and only two who even hit 25% last season. I am expecting to end up with a small primary pool, but let’s take a look and see what happens with this group:
Jeffrey Springs vs Tigers – 26.2% K, 5.6% BB, 2.46 ERA, 3.32 SIERA
Joe Ryan at Royals – 25% K, 7.8% BB, 3.55 ERA, 3.98 SIERA
Luis Garcia vs White Sox – 24.4% K, 7.3% BB, 3.72 ERA, 3.77 SIERA
Kodai Senga at Marlins – First MLB Start
Chris Bassitt at Cardinals – 22.4% K, 6.6% BB, 3.42 ERA, 3.75 SIERA
Jordan Montgomery vs Blue Jays – 21.8% K, 5% BB, 3.48 ERA, 3.61 SIERA
Eric Lauer at Cubs – 23.8% K, 8.9% BB, 3.69 ERA, 4.07 SIERA
Jared Shuster at Nationals – First MLB Start
Jhony Brito vs Giants – First MLB Start
Graham Ashcraft vs Pirates – 15.3% K, 6.5% BB, 4.89 ERA, 4.22 SIERA
The wonkiest part of this pitching slate to me is that somehow Jeffrey Springs is only the 11th most expensive pitcher on DK. With the ‘who knows, maybe’ exception of Kodai Senga, or the ‘who knows, maybe’ Joe Ryan takes another step up, I would say Springs is the SP1 on this slate even before accounting for the home matchup against Detroit. Last season may have been a bit of an outlier, but even at his 3.32 SIERA, he’s an ace on this slate, plus he had a 16:1 K:BB ratio in the spring, which certainly doesn’t hurt. While I have to go back to the mantra of “spread it out in the first week of the season,” this is close to a lock for me on DK. It’s not like he’s on the slate with Cole and deGrom or Woodruff and Strider. The ‘aces’ to spend up for are Chris Bassitt and Kodai Senga. All this is to say what I could have said in one sentence – Jeffrey Springs is the SP1. FanDuel, as usual, is a little sharper with the pitcher pricing, and while Springs is still my SP1, it’s not quite as big a gap.
As clearly as Springs looks like the SP1, no way am I going all-in on any pitcher in this first week, just as I’ve preached all week. I wouldn’t argue with you for doing it, but this is where I’m looking for both pairing with Springs on DK and pivoting on FD:
