Rise & Grind: Friday, April 17th
Welcome to the RotoGrinders cup o’morning joe. Start your day off right here, as we sort through yesterday’s happenings and take a peek at the upcoming DFS day.
In Case You Missed It
Happy Kris Bryant Day! – According to ESPN and several other sources, the Cubs have called up top prospect Kris Bryant from AAA Iowa. Bryant will play 3B for the Cubs in place of Mike Olt, who was placed on the disabled list. If you are a loyal reader of the Rise and Grind, you already knew this move was coming. Before the season I mentioned Bryant would only spend the first 12 days of the season in the minors. This was done in order for the Cubs to maintain an extra year of control in free agency. Sadly, the Cubs play at 2:20 EST this afternoon and Bryant isn’t available on FanDuel yet. If you want use Bryant, and trust me you do, it looks like early only or all day contests on DraftKings are the only option. Make yourself a note for tomorrow though. In all capitals write down, “PLAY KRIS BRYANT EVERYDAY” and refer to this note often. You are welcome, and happy Kris Bryant day.
MLB Yesterday – While none were quite as exciting as the Kris Bryant news, a few MLB games were played yesterday. In the early slate, Lorenzo Cain sent a message to his doubters, aka the 20% who didn’t feel the need to play him. Cain went 3-for-4 with a HR and a 2B and even added a SB and a few RBIs. He scored roughly 1,000 or so DraftKings points. In the late slate, Madison Bumgarner lived up to his namesake. In seven innings, “Bum” allowed six hits, including two home runs en route to four earned runs. That sounds like a bum performance to me.
Dong Report – There were thirteen dongs hit yesterday across six games. No player hit more than one dong. Mark Trumbo and Michael Taylor tied for the longest dong at 419 feet. AJ Pollock hit the shortest dong at only 349 feet. Madison Bumgarner, Dillon Gee, and Cole Hamels were the most generous pitchers, each allowing two dongs.
Winner! Winner! – Plenty of Grinders ended up on the positive side of variance and scored some cash yesterday. Garbage9922 won the early Grand Slam, bearcats594 won the early Squeeze, and Grind won the early Monster. Over on Draftkings, fewfew claimed first and second in the early Payoff Pitch, first in the early Moonshot, and bw5126 won the early Perfect Game. In the late slate, scottiea won the FD Squeeze and stinger88 won the DK Perfect Game and Gold Glove. For the rest of yesterday’s links click here.
On the Menu
Big Friday – Tonight is Big Friday, as all of the DFS sites have upped their guarantees in MLB for the super-sized slate. With just a quick glance I counted over $500K in guaranteed contests on FanDuel. They are highlighted by a $250K Grand Slam and $100K Squeeze. There is also a NYC DFBC Qualifier for only $25. Over on DraftKings, I counted at least $500K in guarantees as well. The feature contest there is a $250K Perfect Game, but a $150K Payoff Pitch and $85K Moonshot are also being offered. In addition to those contests DraftKings also has satellites galore where you can win tickets to various big events happening in the near future. There are also lots of great opportunities on smaller sites. FantasyFeud has a $10K GPP tonight and FantasyAces is running a FABC qualifier. There are of course plenty of contests worth your attention but do to space constraints, I can’t list them all here.
MLB Tonight -The massive GPPs I just mentioned are obviously a result of the 13-game slate that kicks off tonight at 7:05 EST. If you are ready to get your research started, Notorious already has the MLB Grind Down posted. Throughout the day you can also expect the usual array of MLB content. Those pieces will include GPP Plays, Daily Hitter Breakdown, Daily Pitcher Breakdown, the Six-Pack, and a sneak peek into JMtoWin’s Winning Edge (now only for incentives members).
NHL Tonight – Playoff hockey continues with four games on the schedule tonight. There will not be an NHL Daily Plays column, but you can always glean some advice from our Daily Forum Thread Sure, the GPPs are a bit smaller in NHL, but they are still worth your time.
GrindersLive – Once you have feasted on all the written content you can handle, come back at 3:30 EST for advice in podcast form. We have three hours of MLB discussion, starting with BritDevine and Pepsi7. They will be followed by CrazyGabey and Boggslite and then Dean78904 and DraftCheat. If you can’t catch all three hours, at least catch the 5:30 show to get DraftCheat’s thoughts on whether hosting GrindersLive with Dean really is the worst job in America.
Bottom Line – From time to time people, comment on the Rise and Grind mentioning how you can make $80 an hour working from home. These comments are just spam robots and are deleted. I never really gave them a second thought until a community member asked whether FanDuel uses robot entries. The basis of the argument was that only a robot would use Michael Beasley. Then I realized I also used Michael Beasley and some of you did as well. Now I’m wondering if I am a robot. Maybe you are as well. Could it be that we are all just robots? It’s something to think about over this weekend. I off to re-boot over, but I will see you on Monday as long as my circuits don’t get scrambled.