MLB PrizePicks Predictions Today: Top Plays for Tuesday, June 4th
Traditional MLB DFS formats aren’t the only way to profit from daily fantasy baseball. MLB PrizePicks is a great fantasy pick’em site where we can take today’s projections versus theirs and combine two or more baseball predictions for sizeable payouts.
In this space, we’ll explore a few PrizePicks plays for the upcoming MLB slate. This article isn’t the be-all, end-all of great plays or a recommendation for a full ticket; it’s simply a starting place for you to explore thinking about the game within the game. Maybe you want to scatter these plays across entries. Maybe there are only two or three you think are worth playing. Daily fantasy pick’em gives us the flexibility to make only the plays in which we think there is value rather than being forced to create a full lineup while competing against the best DFS players in the industry.
PrizePicks is daily fantasy baseball made simple, and our MLB PrizePicks tool makes the process even simpler.
All stats cited are since the start of the 2023 season unless otherwise noted.
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MLB PrizePicks Predictions for Tuesday, June 4th
- Shota Imanaga MORE Than 7.5 Strikeouts (DEMON)
- Gunnar Henderson MORE Than 2.5 Total Bases (DEMON)
- Kutter Crawford LESS Than 16.5 Outs
- Elly De La Cruz MORE Than 2.5 Total Bases (DEMON)
- Nelson Velazquez MORE Than 1.5 Total Bases (DEMON)
Shota Imanaga MORE Than 7.5 Strikeouts (DEMON)
The White Sox have been total butt against LHP this season. Their projected lineup has just a .293 wOBA with a 27.6% K rate across 254 plate appearances. Imanaga has struck out 7+ in 5 of his last 6 starts, going 6+ IP in 6 of his last 7. Sporting a 25.5% K rate on the season with us projecting him for 7.2 strikeouts, this is my favorite play on the board because the floor is so high in this ceiling situation.
Gunnar Henderson MORE Than 2.5 Total Bases (DEMON)
Speaking of ceiling situations, Henderson gets to lead off against a pitcher, Bowden Francis, who has given up a whole mess of power and is followed up by a bad bullpen. Henderson has a .384 wOBA, .293 ISO, and 14.5% barrel rate against RHP, while Francis has surrendered a 12.6% barrel rate against 204 batters faced. We have Henderson projected for the most total bases (2.7) on the night.
Kutter Crawford LESS Than 16.5 Outs
Crawford is showing himself to be a good fly-ball pitcher this season, but he’s still a fly-ball pitcher facing the Braves in Fenway Park. And he’s been tagged for 4+ ERs in 3 of his last 4 starts. He has a long leash in terms of pitch count, but his projected 94 pitches might not get him through 5 innings against a still power-packed Braves lineup (even without Ronald Acuna). The Braves projected lineup has a whopping .216 ISO on an 11.5% barrel rate against RHP. Crawford’s 30.8% fly-ball rate and near-average 7.7% barrel rate doesn’t profile all that well against Atlanta in a hitters park. We have Crawford projected for 15.7 outs with a tight range of outcomes. Eyeballing his numbers, I’d personally put his floor in the range of 13-14 outs and his ceiling around 18.
Elly De La Cruz MORE Than 2.5 Total Bases (DEMON)
De La Cruz in Coors Field against an extremely high-contact pitcher who struggles with power prevention is a play to which we want exposure. Ty Blach is bad. Real bad. He has a 5.01 SIERA and just a 5.35 K/9 (and you get to De La Cruz with the strikeout) to go with a 10.3% barrel rate allowed — 11.7% to righties. We have De La Cruz projected for exactly 2.5 total bases, so the DEMON boost comes in handy here.
Nelson Velazquez MORE Than 1.5 Total Bases (DEMON)
Sticking with the hitter DEMON boosts, Velazquez had a rough start to the season, but the big power that we saw last season hasn’t disappeared. He has a 12% barrel rate against RHP this season — 16.2% in the last 30 days. Against a pitcher like Triston McKenzie, Velazquez should get great pitches to hit a long way against McKenzie’s 10.9% barrel rate allowed. We have Velazquez projected for 1.8 total bases.
All projections referenced are accurate at the time of writing but subject to change.
Attacking a lot of DEMON boosts on this hitter-friendly slate, I’m gonna be cautious with how large my contests are. I like a high quantity of 3-Play tickets. There’s so much hitting to sprinkle around to which we want exposure, while the pitching projections are actually pretty tight. We should still like Imanaga and Tyler Glasnow MOREs across the board, while attacking Blach, McKenzie, and Francis a good amount.
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