MLB DFS Top Stacks: Tuesday, August 13th
MLB DFS is complex. Most articles are about the individual players most likely to succeed, but the MLB DFS picks most likely to succeed aren’t always the MLB DFS picks we should be most likely to play. With some help from our Top Stacks tool, we will aim to look more at the process instead of just the picks and the teams instead of just the players. We’ll still analyze the MLB player projections that are available in our MLB optimizer, LineupHQ. However, we’ll be more focused on collective ownership, optimal scores, and matchups of full stacks within the context of game selection and leverage.
This slate has a lot of love and hate on the pitching and stacking sides of it. This is gonna have me overweight on the plays I love and fading spots that are iffy. This is an approach we can often employ in smaller fields and 20-max contests fairly easily, but also to be hyper-aggressive in 150-max contests. I think we should take strong stands on this slate.
All stats cited are since the start of the 2024 season unless otherwise noted.
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MLB DFS Picks: Top Stacks for Tuesday, August 13th
CHALKY STACKS
Yankees at Jonathan Cannon
Blue Jays at Carson Fulmer
Diamondbacks vs. Austin Gomber
Jonathan Cannon doesn’t get hit hard, but he gets hit a lot, the Yankees have a ton of power, and Guaranteed Rate is a great ballpark for power.
Cannon’s 81.2% contact rate comes from just 6.04 K/9. The Yankees don’t need to be facing a gas can. They just need to get a lot of wood on the ball, given their projected lineup’s whopping 14.4% barrel rate against righties, highlighted by these huge rates:
Aaron Judge, 25.4%
Giancarlo Stanton, 22%
Juan Soto, 21.3%
Ben Rice, 19.7%
Jazz Chisholm, 13.7%
Add the big rates of Austin Wells (8.7%) and Alex Verdugo (8.1%), the speed of Anthony Volpe, and the potential power of Gleyber Torres, and we can play everyone here. And we’ll need to because out of the chalky stacks, the Yankees should be the chalkiest.
But the Jays and D-Backs are gonna cut into the Yankees ownership, so it’s probably capped. A lot of steam would have to be gained for the Yankees to be runaway mega-chalk on this 9-game slate.
The Yankees are projecting as the best stack, but the ownership cost will force us to be careful in how we craft our lineups around them. We’ll have to step down in pOWN% with our secondary stacks — if not a pitcher or two — to have shots at winning GPPs with Yankees stacks.
We should love the Yankees in all formats, but it’s gonna cost us a lot of lineups to get a leg-up on the field, and we need to be prudent of how we build with the Yankees in those lineups.
Carson Fulmer has a 4.01 BB/9, but he isn’t a total mess. He allows a 10.4% barrel rate to lefties, but the Jays have 0 barrel rates over the 7.7% rate of Steven Horwitz from the left side of the plate. Sure, Daulton Varsho and Joey Loperfido have raw power, but the in-game results leave us wanting more. On the flip-side, Fulmer only allows a 7.8% barrel rate to righties, so the 7.5% rate of George Springer and Alejandro Kirk with the 7.5% rate of Leo Jimenez aren’t very inspiring at double-digit pOWN%.
I really just like Vladimir Guerrero as a one-off or with the lefties as a mini stack, but their pOWN% feels too high to just sprinkle them around. I’m out on the Jays for single entry and small fields for the ownership cost. In MME, I can understand going underweight, but I’d rather go overweight or fade in MME.
The Diamondbacks look better on paper against the 10.6% barrel rate allowed by Austin Gomber, but — man — that ballpark sucks when the roof is closed. Gomber gets a huge bump from Colorado to Arizona, so I don’t love this stack at double-digit pOWN%. There are no double-digit barrel rates against lefties in the projected lineup, which makes things even worse.
That said, Gomber is so bad that — while I’m out on the D-Backs for single entry and small fields, I wanna be underweight or even with the field on them. The middle of the order in Lourdes Gurriel, Josh Bell, Randal Grichuk, and Eugenio Suarez is probably enough power to get us by. And the Rockies bullpen sucks. If this stack succeeds, the second half of the game could become the Corbin Carroll show.
TOP STACKS
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